KARACHI: A young nurse was rescued by police from the alleged wrongful confinement by her paternal family, who had shaved her head as a punishment for wanting to marry of her own free will, officials said on Sunday.

Quaidabad SHO Farasat Shah said that the police found that Naz Fatima, who works as a nurse at the Ojha campus of the Dow University of Health Sciences, had been confined to her father’s home against her will.

He said that a police team raided the house, recovered her and took into custody four suspects, including the nurse’s father.

He said that the woman informed the police that her paternal family beat her and shaved her head because they would not allow her to marry someone of her own free will.

Victim lodges FIR against her father, three others; says she was punished for wanting to marry someone of her own choice

The police said that the nurse later registered a case against her father, Niaz Husain, uncle Kaleem Husain and others under sections 342 (wrongful confinement), 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty), 337-V (Arsh for hair), 337-A-I (punishment of shajjah) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code.

Ms Fatima informed the police that her parents had separated around seven months ago, after which she and her three sisters began living with their mother in a rented house in Qadhafi Town. She stated that for the last month, her father had allegedly been beating her and her sisters, pressuring them to move to his house in Daud Chali, Quaidabad.

On December 12, she said, her father beat her and her sisters again, forcing them to temporarily seek refuge at her friend’s house in Green Town.

She stated that on December 20, her father, her uncle and other relatives stormed into her friend’s house in the afternoon, beating her, tearing her clothes and shaving her head.

The police said that the suspects forcibly took her to her father’s house in Quaidabad, where she was held in wrongful confinement until she managed to contact her lawyer and recount her ordeal.

They added that the lawyer reported the case to the police and she was subsequently released from wrongful confinement.

Published in Dawn, December 23rd, 2024