KARACHI: As fears gripped Gulistan-i-Jauhar residents following media reports of alleged knife attacks on women in the neighbourhood, the police on Thursday claimed to have launched a manhunt for an ‘armed motorcyclist’, who had allegedly left over half a dozen women injured within the last few days while three of the victims turned up to report the case to police, officials said.

Although the police authorities were not sure about the exact number of incidents and the motive for the attacks, they confirmed that the incidents reported by most news channels about the assaults did take place in different blocks of Gulistan-i-Jauhar.

About the exact number of such cases, the police said that not more than three victims had approached the police with complaints that a ‘knife-carrying lone motorcyclist’ had attacked them from behind.

“We have registered three FIRs — two at the Sharea Faisal police station and one at the Gulistan-i-Jauhar police station — about two incidents in which three women were stabbed with a sharp weapon by a lone motorcyclist,” said Gulshan-i-Iqbal SP Ghulam Murtaza Bhutto.

Speaking to Dawn, the officer said that the three knife attacks took place on Monday.

However, a local hospital administration in Gulistan-i-Jauhar told the police that they had also received one woman injured by some sharp instrument on Tuesday.

The police initiated investigation into these attacks.

“The police have launched a manhunt by deploying officers in plain clothes,” said the Gulshan SP.

The officer said that the police have got some clues.

The Sharea Faisal police have registered an FIR (489/2017) on complaint of Raza Mohammed under Sections 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty) and 337 (Shajjah: whoever causes on the head or face of any person, any hurt) of the Pakistan Penal Code against unidentified suspect.

The complainant in his statement before the police said that his wife, Hina Raza, along with her friend Ms Shahida Perveen left home on Monday to buy something in Gulistan-i-Jauhar when a motorcyclist attacked them from behind with a sharp instrument causing minor injuries to them.

In another FIR (479/2017) registered at the Gulistan-i-Jauhar police station under the same Sections of the PPC, the complainant, Hajira, told the police that on Sept 26, she had left a home in Chishti Nagar of Gulistan-i-Jauhar when a motorcyclist attacked her from behind with a knife and fled. She worked as a domestic helper in the same area.

IGP of Sindh A. D. Khowaja had already ordered DIG East Sultan Ali Khowaja to conduct a detailed inquiry into these incidents and submit a report to him.

Quoting SSP East Samiullah Soomro, officials said, three injured women were brought to a local private healthcare facility for treatment in the past two days.

He said the injured women were approached by the local police, but they refused to register complaints.

Meanwhile, adviser to the Sindh chief minister on social welfare Shamim Mumtaz on Thursday took notice of the alleged attacks on women and asked the police to arrest the culprits involved in the incidents immediately, officials said.

Officials in the social welfare ministry said that Ms Mumtaz in presence of the chairperson of the Sindh Commission on the Status of Women, Nuzhat Shireen, telephoned the Karachi East’s senior superintendent of police directing him to find out the real motives behind such incidents.

Published in Dawn, September 29th, 2017