KARACHI: Police have booked five men, including a constable, for killing a dog of a rare breed in a Hill Park neighbourhood.

The Ferozabad police booked constable Ali Hassan Shah of Brigade police and four private people — Mustafa, Waheed Kohati, Ali and Khalid Attockwala — under Sections of 429 and 34 of the Pakistan Penal Code.

Section 429 pertains to “mischief by killing or maiming cattle, etc, of any value or any animal of the value of fifty rupees”.

It says “whoever commits mischief by killing, poisoning, maiming or rendering useless, any elephant, camel, horse, mule, buffalo, bull, cow or ox, whatever may be the value thereof, or any other animal of the value of fifty rupees or upwards, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to five years, or with both”.

The Section 34 pertains to “acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention”.

Additional District and Sessions’ Judge (East) had ordered the police to record statement of complainant Riaz Hussain and register a case if cognizable offence was made out.

The complainant told Dawn that the police had arrested Mustafa and Kohati while three other men, including constable Shah, were still absconding.

The complainant said he had been working as a waiter at different hotels in the Hill Park neighbourhood for the past 40 years.

He said a female teacher at the Punjab Allied School had gifted him a puppy of a rare breed called ‘Majorca Shepherd’.

Mr Hussain said he kept and raised the puppy for two years and named it Joji, adding that Constable Shah and Mustafa had asked him to give them the dog days ago, but he refused.

“Upon my refusal, they (suspects) abused me and threatened me by saying that the days of the dog have been numbered,” said the complainant, adding that on the night of Feb 9 he went to sleep and the next morning he found his dog missing.

The dog’s owner said later he found the dog’s body wrapped up in a piece of cloth with its throat slit.

Earlier, he had approached the Ferozabad police to lodge an FIR, but the officials refused.

Published in Dawn, June 25th, 2023