ISLAMABAD: Young Adil Zaib is back in his hometown Mansehra from a ‘job hunting trip’ to India . But the cousin who took him there made big money.

Poor Adil, 20, lost 75 per cent of his liver in the deal, Dawn learnt from police officials in the know of his weird story.

They said police had arrested Taj Mohammad, father of the cousin Jawad, after Adil’s father Jahan Zaib filed a case against them, and Babar Pervaiz, a nephew of Taj, under PPC 334 that deals with Islamic punishments for bodily hurt.

Preliminary investigations into the FIR registered by Jahan Zaib with the Aabpara police on November 1, the day his son reached Islamabad from his horrible trip to India, found stitches on Adil’s abdomen and his passport bore entry and exit dates of October 1 and October 29, stamped at New Delhi airport.

Police went after the nominated accused when a medical board suggested 75 per cent of Adil’s liver had been removed.

Adil was put in the Federal Government Services Hospital in Islamabad where doctors restored his health to the point he could be discharged safely.

“His survival is a miracle,” a police officer quoted the doctors as saying.

Before leaving for home, Adil told police that he fell for the offer of his uncle Taj and cousin Jawad to go hunting for a driver’s job in India.

“I reached their house in Islamabad on September 29. I was told we would earn lot of money in India where tourism is booming,” he said.

“They took my passport to get the visa and served me a juice that made me dizzy, as if I was under anaesthesia. I could hear people but could not move or speak myself,” he said, adding that they took him to Lahore and flew him to New Delhi as a patient.

“When I regained consciousness I learnt I was lying in Fortis Hospital of New Dehli, where a couple with their daughter bore our expenses – mine and the two accused (Jawad and Babar).

“I was told to keep my mouth shut otherwise the Indian police would throw me into jail for illegal entry, as my passport was with them.

“On October 10, I was informed that I was brought to India for liver transplant for a Pakistani woman. Her parents remained by my side all the time I did not open my mouth before the doctors for fear of arrest.

“On October 12, I was operated upon for the transplantation. I did not know the identity of the recipient of my liver or the couple except that they were Pakistanis. I remained in the hospital till I was flown back to Lahore with the accused,” Adil said.

On reaching Lahore on October 29, he said the accused cousins just abandoned him at the airport. Weak from the operation and with no money in his pocket, he said he begged and borrowed for two days to reach Islamabad and phoned his family in Mansehra to come to his help.

A police officer said that according to Adil, his cousins got Rs1.5 million from the family of the recipient of his liver.

“My son was drugged and taken to a man his cousin addressed as ‘colonel sahib’ and then to India where his liver was removed,” said Jahan Zaib, adding that Jawad’s cousin (Babar) lived in Karachi and was ‘an accomplice’.

Published in Dawn, November 19th, 2014