SAHIWAL: Police investigators did not seek CCTV footage to determine how transperson, Majid alias Qasim, reached the garbage heap near the cab stand of the Remount locality during noon of Sept 1 where his burnt remains were found days after the incident.

This shows investigators’ negligence in the investigation into the tragic death of the transgender.

The transperson had allegedly been burnt alive by unidentified person(s) at the cab stand along Mall Mandi Chowk. The incident was reported by the media on Sept 6, after videos of the gruesome incident were circulated on social media.

The inquiry committee, comprising three senior police officers -- SP Investigation Sajjad Hussain, DSP Investigation Rana Fawad and DSP City Humayun Iftikhar -- prepared the final report on the incident.

Dawn saw the final report having both audio and video interviews with 22 people but it is silent on any efforts by the investigators to get the CCTV footage from the surrounding localities.

The report reached the conclusion, terming the incident an accident. It declared the deceased transperson an addict who had probably taken some drug or other intoxicant while sitting on the garbage heap and burnt himself up to 80pc. Interestingly, none of the investigators took the CCTV footage to track how Majid had actually reached the spot in the busy hours in a road run from the Mission Chowk to Mall Mandi Chowk. The report says there is no witness to the incident.

Majid might have arrived at the spot either from the Mall Mandi Chowk or Mission Chowk by walking on road because there is no other way to reach it. At noon, the road is mostly busy with all kind of traffic, commuters and fruit vendors. The question is why the investigators did not seek the CCTV footage of the road to track how the deceased reached the garbage heap.

This correspondent visited the spot and walked from Mall Mandi Chowk to Mission Chowk and located more than one dozen CCTV cameras at four spots, namely Mission Hospital, Remount Office, and two private petrol pumps. The footage from these cameras should have been made a part of the investigation. Not a single handler of the CCTV footage told this correspondence that they were approached by the police or any other investigation agency. The final investigation report did not describe any details of seeking CCTV footage.

Despite the passage of a month since the incident, the district police have, so far, failed to details of the whereabouts of the burnt transperson. This also shows the flaws in the investigation.

On other hand, the forensic analysis report from Lahore has not arrived yet. It could throw some light on the real cause of death which might support the police investigation or reject its findings which mostly rely on the accounts of Rescue 1122 personnel and post-mortem examination report which had not found any trace of inflammable chemical on the victim’s body.

There are still many unanswered questions regarding the death of the transperson as the police investigation report is silent about them. The questions like who was Majid alias Qasim, how he arrived at the garbage heap and burnt himself to death, how the garbage heap caught fire, what sort of drug he took, why he did not cry for help when 80 90pc of his body was burnt are still unanswered.

While replying to a question sources in the regional police office said, “police is not lenient and following to get forensic report as early as possible”.

Published in Dawn, October 6th, 2018