QUETTA: Two teenage sisters suffered burn injuries on the face and neck when masked men sprayed acid on them in Mastung on Tuesday.

This is the second such incident to take place in Balochistan in as many days. On Monday a group of masked men had sprinkled acid on four women busy in Eid shopping in Quetta.

No-one claimed responsibility and police and investigating agencies have not been able to trace the perpetrators of Monday’s attack.

The Mastung girls were in the town’s main bazaar when one the assailants sprayed acid on them with a syringe. According to DPO Abdul Rauf Baraich, the girls were attacked when a large number of people were in the bazaar for Eid shopping.

The girls were taken to a local hospital and later referred to the burns ward in the Bolan Medical College Hospital in Quetta. The victims of Monday’s attack are under treatment at the same hospital.

“One of the girls has suffered burn injuries on the face and the other on the neck,” police said, adding that their condition was stable.

A case has been registered and police are said to be looking for the culprits.

“We hope that we would succeed in bringing them to book soon,” DPO Baraich said, adding that a special team was investigating the incident “from different angles”.

Over the past two years, incidents of acid attacks on women have been repeated in Balochistan. Women are held in high esteem in the province, but the rise of pseudo-religious extremists is gradually eroding the societal norms.

Other such attacks have taken place in Quetta, Kalat and Dalbandin.

Published in Dawn, July 23rd, 2014