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KARACHI, Oct 31: A team of doctors and medical technicians from the police department on Wednesday acquired the samples from dead bodies of the October 18 blast victims on Wednesday for DNA tests to determine their identities. Officials believe the tests may help the investigation.
Sources said the six-member team took almost five hours to collect the samples from the bodies and body parts but could not complete the task. The job might take another couple of days to be completed.
A senior official said all the bodies were in bad condition while the majority of the samples were taken from different body parts, which made the job tougher to determine the exact number of victims at the Edhi morgue located in Sohrab Goth.
“There are only five complete dead bodies which one can recognize,” said police surgeon Dr Bashir Sheikh, who headed the department’s team. Dr Ejaz Khokar, Dr Abdul Haq, Dr Jagdeesh, Dr Javed Shah and Dr Yasmin Qamar were among other members of the team.
“There are some 16 bags which contain dozens of human body parts. So, it’s a very difficult job to confirm the exact number of dead bodies in the morgue,” he said.
He said the team collected samples of two dead bodies, which were almost charred and also inspected half of another body. The fourth sample was collected from another man’s body, who died from splinter wounds and had no signs of burns.
“Out of 16, we have completed the inspection of three bags and the remaining bags would be opened on Thursday for sample collection,” added Dr Sheikh. “From three bags we got 16 pieces of different human body parts and three right legs, which suggest at least three victims,” he added.
He said all the samples taken so far suggested that the victims were adult males and there was no sign of a woman’s or child’s body found yet. The samples, which were collected from the victims’ bodies, included nails, hair roots, bones and seven tissues.
“The team also brought some technicians with it. The nature of the job is very sensitive and needs the complete attention of the people concerned,” said Mohammad Aman, an Edhi morgue official, who assisted the team.
Results may lead to suspects
Apart from identification of the victims, the police officials see the DNA tests as being instrumental in setting the future lines of the investigation, with possible leads to the suspects.
“It can help in both ways,” said Capital City Police Officer Azhar Ali Farooqi. “There are some persons who are claimed by their family members to be missing. So we can take the samples of the missing persons’ family members and match them with the results of the DNA tests of the victims.”
He said the action would help determine the fate of such missing persons to a large extent and at the same time there were also chances that the final reports of the tests could lead to some links with the suspects, whose photographs were released by the police last week.
Meanwhile, the team also found other objects while collecting samples from the bodies, which are believed to be the belongings of the victims.
“We have found a Sony Ericcson mobile phone, which was almost burnt and a pair of Armani brand trousers in the bags which contained the body parts,” said police surgeon Dr Sheikh.He said the samples would be sent to the Dr A.Q. Khan Institute of Biotechnology & Genetic Engineering at the University of Karachi for final DNA testing once the team collected samples from all the body parts.
