ISLAMABAD: Though police are still investigating the child maid abuse case, initial statements of the judge and his wife recorded after the compromise with her parents claimed that they had paid Rs42,000 in advance for keeping her at their home.

Additional district and sessions judge (ADSJ) Raja Khurram Ali Khan and his wife in their statements recorded on January 3, the day when ADSJ Raja Asif Mehmood Khan and another ADSJ Atta Rabbani confirmed her pre-arrest bail and handed over the custody of Tayyaba to her parents, also claimed that they had been the girl’s guardians since she was seven-and-a-half years old.

The judge’s wife in her statement also said the girl was living in the servant quarter of the house.

However, before the Supreme Court, Mohammad Azam, the father of Tayyaba, 10, testified that he had received Rs18,000 from a woman who provided his minor daughter as a maid to the ADSJ on August 14, 2014, against Rs3,000 per month.

Denying all the charges of torture, the judge and his wife in their statements said a few neighbours allegedly hatched a conspiracy against them. The couple said they had kept the girl on a humanitarian basis due to poverty of her parents.

In initial statements, judge and his wife said they had been Tayyaba’s guardians since she was seven

The judge and his spouse were booked after the minor girl accused them of keeping her in a wrongful confinement, burning her hand over a missing broom, beating her with a ladle, detaining her in storeroom and threatening her of even worse.

ADSJ Khurram said on Dec 27, a day before Tayyaba’s photograph surfaced in the social media, he returned from his village at around 7pm.

His wife informed him that Tayyaba had gone to the house of a neighbour and was refusing to come back.

Subsequently, he stated, her disappearance was reported to the I-9 police.

Early on Dec 29, the judge said, the girl came back to his house and in the evening was handed over to SHO Khalid Awan who took her for a medical examination and then sent her to Darul Aman.

The judge’s spouse in her statement said Tayyaba was kept as a babysitter for her son, Raja Mohammad Ali Khan, and the woman who had brought her was given money for helping the girl’s parents.

After the compromise between the judge and the parents of Tayyaba, Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Justice Saqib Nisar took suo motu notice of the alleged torture and the subsequent compromise deed materialised by Raja Zahoor Hassan, a lawyer.

Mr Hassan was the counsel for the child’s parents who brought them to Islamabad from Faisalabad to make the compromise deed, putting thumb impressions of the minor’s parents on affidavits and allegedly keeping them at an isolated place even after the apex court took notice of the matter.

The apex court on January 5 and 6 ordered the police to produce the minor girl. However, the police could not bring the child as her whereabouts were not known.

When CJP Nisar strictly directed the police to produce the girl, the police arrested a number of people, including Mr Hassan. He was released after the recovery of the girl.

Hearing the suo motu notice, CJP Nisar observed that the role of Mr Hassan was of utmost importance in materialising the deal. The CJP also remarked that ADSJ Atta Rabbani handed over Tayyaba to her parents in haste.

The apex court will resume hearing of the case on January 18.

Published in Dawn January 17th, 2017