RAWALPINDI: The two women and a little girl, whose bodies were found in their house in Rawat on Wednesday, seem to have been strangled five to six days ago, the initial post-mortem report has revealed.

“It is yet to be established if the women were drugged before they were strangled,” Superintendent of Police Iftikharul Haq told Dawn.

The decomposed bodies of three women of the same family-including Munira Bibi who is thought to have been between 65 and 70 years of age, her 27-year-old daughter Nasira Bibi and four-and-a-half year old granddaughter Muskan-were found inside their locked house on Wednesday.

The bodies of the elderly woman and her granddaughter were in the store room and were covered with a quilt while Nasira’s body was in a room of the house.

According to SP Haq, two mobile phones belonging to Nasira were found in the house which may help track down the killer, adding that the crime seems to be an act of revenge against the family.

According to the police an ash tray with a cigarette butt was found at the crime scene as well as two half full bottles of liquor on the roof.

Nasira ran a beauty parlour and, according to the police, had obtained khulla from her husband and had been living with her mother since along with her young daughter.

The police said more than 10 of the victims’ neighbours had been interviewed on Thursday as part of investigations. However, the police have not been able to find anything which could help them and no one has yet come forward with information on whether they have seen suspicious people coming and going from the house during the last week.

In an unrelated incident, a jeweller was shot during a robbery at Kuri Road Sadiqabad on Thursday. According to the police, four men had walked into Rana Amir Zeeshan’s shop and held him at gunpoint. They shot him when he put up resistance and made away with jewellery worth Rs500,000.

Published in Dawn, August 18th, 2017