HYDERABAD: A session court official found two minor girls in illegal detention during a surprise visit of women police station late on Friday evening.

The girls were produced before additional district judge-VIII on Saturday who handed them over to their maternal uncle with the observation that he was at liberty to lodge an FIR against the SHO of the women police station.

The court official Abdul Karim Sahto found Zaibu and Shahnaz detained along with 12 other women.

He was directed to take action after the court received an application from one Mohammad Hayat, seeking recovery of his family members who, he said, were picked up by Chalgari police on April 26.

The court official found entry about the 12 women in the police station’s record but there was no entry about the girls. He, therefore, directed the SHO to appear in court along with detainees.

The women were kept at women police station on Friday after their arrest by Site police. On Saturday they were produced before civil judge and judicial magistrate-IX who remanded women in judicial custody.

Meanwhile, residents of Umar Khan Laasi village including old men, women and children staged a sit-in outside Shahbaz Building against Hyderabad police and land grabbers. They appealed to IGP Sindh and interior minister Chaudhry Nisar to take notice of the injustice meted out to them.

The protesters said that on April 25 Hyderabad police along with builder Chaudhry Zulfikar demolished their houses and forced them to vacate their dwellings.

They arrested 72 villagers including men, women and children and took away 20 cows, 45 goats, 10 buffaloes, Rs500,000 in cash, 50 tola gold, four motorbikes, two licensed shot guns and 115 wheat bags.

Published in Dawn, May 1st, 2016