BADIN: Many people including women and a policeman were injured when police carried out raids on Allah Rakhyo Bhurgari near Nindo Shahar town on Wednesday apparently to recover a woman allegedly kidnapped by three suspects a few days ago.

Villagers claimed that the woman had contracted a free-will marriage but plain-clothes police trespassed a number of houses to take away the woman.

There were conflicting accounts of the whole episode given by the police and villagers.

Trouble started when plain-clothes policemen started breaking into several houses one after the other and allegedly misbehaved with the inmates without identifying themselves.

Taking them as criminals, the affected families posed stiff resistance to their alleged high-handedness and grabbed a couple of them, who later turned out to be Talhar SHO Manzoor Korai and Constable Qurban Ali. The other members of the police team took to their toes and, according to the police, the SHO and the constable had been held hostage for about three hours.

Villagers said they were caught after they ruthlessly beat up men and women after trespassing their houses without telling them about the matter.

Later, a strong force drawn from various police stations of the district was sent to the village under the supervision of Badin DSP Shaukat Ali Shahani to rescue the hostages. A convoy of over a dozen vehicles including two armoured personnel carriers stormed the village but residents supported by inhabitants of several other neighbouring villages blocked their way.

Police fired into the air to scare them away and make their way into the village. The police force raided several houses despite stiff resistance posed by the inmates.

An unspecified number of people, including a constable, were injured in the clashes.

Two of the injured persons, Mohammed Yousuf and Begum Bhurgari, were admitted to the Badin Civil Hospital after they were arrested along with several other people. The other injured persons, including constable Fayyaz Hussain, were provided treatment at the Nindo Shahar rural health centre.

Villagers claimed that police took away men, women and children, along with the cash, valuables and animals, with them.

It was gathered that Ayub Jamali and Khadija Jamali, the couple at the centre of the controversy, had contracted a free-will marriage a few days back in a Badin court and turned to their village on Tuesday despite facing threats to their lives by the woman’s relatives. Police said they the SHO and his team had gone to the village on Wednesday after receiving information about the presence of Khadija Jamali in a house. They said her father, Sikendar Jamali, had lodged an FIR claiming that his 12-year-old daughter (not Khadija Jamali) was kidnapped by Ayub Jamali, Wali Mohammed and Mohammad Khan from Rip Sharif village three days back.

In this regard, they said, SHO Korai and his team raided the house of Jan Mohammed Bhurgari but villagers caught the police officer and one of his team members. Badin SSP Khalid Mustafa Korai said that a police force led by the Badin DSP was sent to the village to rescue the hostage, recover the kidnap victim and arrest the nominated suspects.

On their part, the affected villagers said the village was first raided by the civvies and then a big police force who manhandled many men and women, ransacked their houses and took away money, valuables and cattle head, besides setting a few houses on fire.

They said the police arrested all those injured during the raids.

Published in Dawn, May 28th, 2015

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