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'How long will it take before you all forget about my sister?'
This article was originally published in Dawn on January 12th, 2018.
As the sun began to set on Jan 4, six-year-old Zainab Amin performed her wuzu before setting out to her maternal aunt’s place for Quran lessons.
“Zainab and her cousin, Osman, used to go to their khala’s house — which is a five-minute walk — every day around 6.30pm for around half an hour. Just like any other day, I gave the children milk and they headed off for their lessons.”
“This was part of her daily routine,” her paternal aunt, Anis Fatima, tells me at their family home, located in a narrow street off Haji Ali Road in Kasur.
Also read: Rape, murder of 6-year-old Zainab shows state's indifference towards protecting citizens
The house is a simple two-storey structure opposite the local mosque, with three bedrooms and a living room on the ground floor. Zainab’s father, Muhammad Amin, a shopkeeper by profession, lives here with two younger brothers, their wives and children.
On that fateful January day, however, Amin and his wife Nusrat had been on a pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia.
Osman, a shy seven-year-old, says Zainab ran ahead of him. When he finally walked into the Quran lesson, she was not there.
“She ran ahead of me very fast.” Did she say something to you? Did you see where she was headed? I ask.
He shakes his head ‘no’.
Rukhsana, the aunt who mentored the children, says Zainab never showed up.
“When her family called me 40 minutes later to ask where she was, I assumed she had gone to one of our relatives’ homes in the neighbourhood,” she says.
Back at Zainab’s house, the family realised she was missing when they gathered for dinner.
“We left our food and started looking for her,” another aunt, Abida Shaheen, recalls.
“We assumed she may have gone to her phuppo’s house next door. She had been staying there a lot since her parents left for umrah.”
But Zainab was nowhere to be found. At 9.30pm, her youngest paternal uncle, Mohammad Adnan, finally rang up the police to file a missing person report.
Soon, there were policemen combing the neighbourhood for any sign of the little girl. The family even made an announcement through the mosque’s loudspeaker to ask the area’s residents for information.
At 4am, they informed Zainab’s parents in Makkah.
“There had been a similar incident a few days ago … [involving the] abduction and murder of a young girl on Perowala Road,” says Adnan.
The father of that child is a worker at a local bakery.
When he heard that Zainab was missing, he went over the CCTV footage from a camera installed outside his bakery. He found something of interest.
“He asked us if it was Zainab. The footage is black and white, but you could tell by the way she was walking it was her,” recalls Adnan.
She had been wearing leggings and an orange jersey over a black and white shirt. On Jan 9, five days after she had disappeared, labourers found her body, in the same clothes, from a trash pile.
Her relatives are still in shock.
Each family member says they never thought she could disappear from outside their house: that they know everyone in the neighbourhood, which is always full of people; that even if you come by at 2am, you will find people standing around and a shop or two open.
They cannot comprehend how Zainab could have gone missing from a bustling neighbourhood where their own children play.
As I sit with Zainab’s family the morning after they laid her to rest, her sister, Laiba, 16, shares her anguish.
“I am not crying because she is dead. My heart breaks to think that she was hurt. I cannot bear it,” she says.
We are in a room crowded by women from the neighbourhood. On one sofa in the centre, Zainab’s mother wails and calls out for her murdered child.
“When my mother was pregnant with Zainab, she had a very complicated delivery,” Laiba confides. “She underwent two operations, was on the ventilator, and was given 19 bags of blood. She was hospitalised for 16 days and didn’t see Zainab till she came home.”
The women in the room file in and out, stroking Nusrat’s shoulder and whispering prayers and words of comfort.
Laiba holds up a photograph of Zainab — the one that sparked a social media campaign for justice and widespread rioting in Kasur.
“I took the photograph last Sunday. She went missing on Thursday. People started asking for a photo when we were looking for her, so we had this developed on Friday.”
“It’s the only photograph I have of her,” Laiba says, her striking green eyes looking so much like Zainab’s in the photo.
Laiba turns to ask me: “How long will it take before you all forget about my sister?”
A woman tells the family not to grieve, that their daughter is shaheed; that Zainab’s death after so many similar cases will finally jolt the dormant state into action. But for her mother and sisters, it is too little too late.
Published in Dawn, January 12th, 2018
Comments (28) Closed
Heart touching.
justices in Pakistan is very difficult till we get a system with honesty these things always happen in Pakistan
I feel like I have lost a daughter:( Cant even imagine how Zainab's family will ever get over her brutal murder....
Being a sister and mother, just reading this makes me shudder. May Allah never let anyone go through the plight of this family. May Allah give the family sabr to deal with their pain. And may we see the monsters behind such inhuman crimes face justice in this world and in the hereafter too.
I feel sick to my stomach just to think that this incident was just like so many others that had taken places at the very same crime location which is supposedly a crime scene for so many incidents for almost two years.Police could have done some patroling of the area and tried to secure it being aware that its a child abuse prone area but they did nothing.
What else do I say...i feel sorry for this little angel and her family and our societies..India is no more different and behind with such cases and its not only India even in thr states and so many other western countries such incidents are on rise.
But we the people of same race have to stand up against such crimes against our children please we have to stop this menace of monsterly killings and defemation of our childrens prestige.
I Stand in solidarity with the people of Pakistan and I know You guys will surely stand up against this and will make sure those behind it are behind bars and get their desired punishment.
NEVER I WILL FORGET IT!
Day after no one will remember her
Zainab will always live in our hearts until we meet her during after life
How long will it take for all of us to forget about Zainab? What a saddening but a very accurate statement . We will forget about her just like we have forgotten about the previous incidents.Its just the matter of timings .Some will forget it sooner and other like immediate families will take a longer time. We are not designed like this by Almighty. I am not saying that we have become emotionless puppets but had our lives been stuck in such incidents then we could not have been functional enough to perform whatever our maker has destined for us. The more important question in my humble opinion is that Will the killers be caught and the family served justice? We all should pray that they are caught just like the millions of other criminals so at least the family gets some closure. May Allah protect our families and not only punish the culprits but also guide the potential perpetrators.
Zainab's sister asks how long will it take for people to forget her sister...The answer is: Just remember over 100 APS school children killed two years back and recently the youth Mashaal Khan. This nation wakes up suddenly to such incidents and unfortunately goes into deep slumber again till a new incident, even a political one, grabs the space at television screens. A sorry state indeed.
Heart wrenching incident. May her little innocent soul rest in peace. One important thing which should be done is to have a blanket ban on pornographic internet content. Please understand that the subcontinent is not ready for this . The society is still evolving. People have access to such material on their mobile phones. And then these perverts look for helpless children , or women. Exemplary death punishment should be given!
Zainab must be immortalized by naming a sexual assault law in her name that has severe punishment and having an Alert in her name called Zainab Alert which represent a number like 211. So when ever someone dials 211 it should mean a child is kidnapped and all store doors should be closed from where the number is dialed from, all intersections to the area should be blocked and Police should cordoned off all entrance and exit points to the area then police and area residents scour the area until the child is found and culprit is caught. My two cents to the solution of this tragedy so that Zainab is never forgotten. RIP oh little one!
So what's new? Now we wait for the next such foul incident. It simply goes on and on in this unfair and failed society. No dharnas here, PTI? I ask this as your supporter, as you are the only ones likely to bring real change to Pakistan.
She will never be forgotten! Atleast not by any mother!
I am losing hope in humanity...
Terrible, RIP little angel..
In 1996, something similar had happened to a girl called Amber, in Texas. In her memory, lawmakers and law enforcers instituted what is now called the 'Amber Alert System'. As soon as a child goes missing, all cell phones in a wide region receive the information. Additionally, all electronic billboards suddenly switch to showing the missing person's photo and any other information such as the suspect's features or his car description, etc. This system has been very effective. We in Pakistan should now start the Zainab Alert.
She will never be forgotten. She has been imprinted on our souls forever. Her pain would remain with us till we die. I was sitting with my colleagues while reading her news and tears started flowing. I remember I last cried when I read what Nirbhaya went through. Who are these people? How can humanity condescend to such a level?? How many such serene souls need to sacrifice themselves to trigger our souls??? And for how long so called educated people like us would remain silent????
@N_Saq I was thinking the same yesterday. Why Pakistan doesn't have something similar to Amber Alert that we get in USA at the instance child is reported missing? Pictures are floated and mobile phones receive alerts immediately. Pakistan needs Zainab-Alert and it needs to make sure that no little kid goes through this ordeal again. I can't imagine how she lived through those 4 days of torture in the hand of this evil person!
Extremely saddened at what happened to this beautiful young girl and her family but a question keeps coming up and that is the why are parents and carers of these young children not taking proper responsibility,why are young girls allowed to go out on their own even for a little distance especially in kasur where around that area 10 girls were abducted and murdered ,simple precautionary steps can save lives only if someone bothers to take them,what a shame !!
Very sad. Would the culprit be identified from the CCTV finally? Also, there should be alerts to public given the news of earlier similar crimes in the area to not leave children alone as the offender was still at large. Given the dangers of the times, it's better for guardians to accompany the children on the walk.
Quite contrary to the time-tested methodology in the West, our chain of custody, or responsibility, when kids move around is negligible.
It has been seen time and again that whenever there's a lapse of even a short while when kids are out of sight, accidents or heinous crimes might occur especially in places that are considered vulnerable.
I am not trying to pass the blame onto the family members but for a child whose parents are away, there needs to be one relative in-charge. Rather than speculating for the first few hours that the child might be with an aunt next doors or elsewhere, a thorough search instantly would've been an appropriate approach. Moreover, in an area, where such sick incidences have occurred in the past, extra caution of not letting kids walk alone or frequent checking on the kids in addition to keeping an eye on them from door to door should've been the norm.
For kids who are of Zainab's age in the west, every kids is accounted for and tracked at all times.
Very sad.. RIP zainab.
@Leo It is often the case that these types of abusers were themselves victims of sexual abuse as children. When these people commit these horrific acts they are acting out what they had experienced, and are in desperate need of professional help. Many factors can contribute to this behaviour. Prayers go out to the victim's family.
I will never her beautiful face. She will be my dead daughter. Love you Zainab.
@Ali well said
@Dr. Sajjad Me too.
I feel really bad. What did she do?She was just a kid. The justice, if given won't bring this angel back but that justice should be so strong that, any man should tremble with fear before doing such deed.