UMERKOT: Members of a special medical board exhumed body of 28-year-old married woman and carried out post mortem on it at Bhandari graveyard in Shahmir Colony here on Thursday following suspicions by the bereaved family over the manner of her death.

The exhumation was conducted under the supervision of Magistrate Muneer Ahmed Jagsi on the orders of Civil Judge & Judicial Magistrate-I, Umerkot, who constituted the medical board on Aug 25.

The court’s directive came in response to an application (No.12/2025) filed by late Sakina’s brother, Abdul Rehman Rahimoon, who sought the exhumation and post mortem of his sister, claiming she had died in suspicious circumstances on June 24.

Sakina, wife of Bilawal Rahimoon, was mother of two young sons, aged five and three, and was eight months pregnant at the time of her death. Since her marriage in 2018, she had faced domestic violence, forcing her to go live with her family, said the victim’s relatives.

On June 12 this year, she returned to her in-laws’ home after the community elders brought about a settlement between the two families but just 12 days later, she was brought to Civil Hospital Umerkot, where doctors declared her dead, they said.

Sakina’s in-laws claimed she had died by suicide, a claim initially accepted by her family when they assured them on oath and hence she was buried without post mortem, despite opposition from a relative, Dost Muhammad Rahimoon, who pressed the family to demand an autopsy.

The family’s doubts grew strong when the neighbours reported hearing Sakina’s screams the night before her death, in which she allegedly pleaded: “Don’t kill me, let me go to my parents’ house.”

The family suspected that she was tortured and then hanged to make her death appear a suicide. There were rope marks visible on her neck, said the family and accused Sakina’s husband Bilawal, his father Khameeso, and brother Subhan of being responsible for her death.

On July 15, the court directed Umerkot City police station’s SHO to investigate Sakina’s death and submit a report. Subsequently, it ordered exhumation of her body to enable forensic examination.

The medical board comprised professors and doctors of Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences, Jamshoro.

Published in Dawn, August 29th, 2025