MUZAFFARGARH, April 10: Crime against women continues unabated in several parts of Punjab, as two women have recently fallen prey to the prurience of stone-hearted men.

A dozen or so men abducted two women and raped them in a jungle for two nights (March 11-12). The gangsters, it is learnt, wanted to teach them a lesson for a nephew of one of them took away a girl of the former’s family.

Akram Baloch told Dawn that his nephew Pehlwan Baloch and daughter of Latif eloped on Feb 18 last. However, after two weeks (March 8) a panchayat (village jury) asked Akram to return the girl to her father. Pehlwan honoured the call of his uncle and allowed the girl to go back to her parents and also paid fine imposed on him by the jury.

Akram said Latif gave a sound beating to his daughter who once again left her house and contracted court marriage with Pehlwan on March 11. That very night, Latif along with 11 people, came to Akram Baloch’s place at Basti Kandhi Balochan and abducted his wife, who was about to have a child, and his cousin Fatima. They kept them in jungle and raped them for two nights.

The Rohallanwali police registered a case against the culprits, but failed to arrest them. SHO Khalid Rauf said the police were making efforts to arrest the gangsters, though there was political pressure on him.

The anguished Akram said he would commit suicide if the suspects were not arrested.

KIDNAP CASE: The district police have failed to recover two kidnapped men as the kidnappers gave a three-day deadline to their family to arrange Rs1 million ransom otherwise they would kill the victims.