FAISALABAD: Five policemen, including the Lundianwala station house officer, were suspended from service as a post-mortem report confirmed that an under- detention man was tortured who later died at a state-run hospital.

On Oct 9, the Lundianwala police picked up Ghulam Murtaza of Nankana Sahib and took him to the Buchiana police post.

Ghulam Mustafa, brother of Murtaza, in his application to the police said he was on way to Nankana along with Murtaza and two others when policemen, including sub-inspector Khizar Hayat, three constables Mursal Nawaz, Abdul Waheed and Shabbir Khan and two unidentified persons intercepted them near Zafarwal Adda.

Post-mortem report confirms youth was severely tortured

He said the policemen had [allegedly] started thrashing Murtaza, bundled him into a vehicle and took him to Buchiana police post where “we also reached.”

He said police allegedly tortured Murtaza to death and left his body at the Jaranwala THQ hospital on the night of Oct 9. He alleged that Murtaza was tortured at the behest of Lundianwala SHO Abdul Jabbar.

Following the death of Murtaza, scores of people had staged a protest demonstration, blocked traffic on Jaranwala-Nankana Road and thrashed some motorists.

The protesters chanted slogans against the police and demanded immediate arrest of the [responsible] policemen.

However, police neither suspended nor arrested any of the officials despite the fact that they were booked under sections 109, 148, 149 and 302 of the PPC.

Police officials claimed that Murtaza, who was taken into custody in connection with a kidnap case of a woman, had suffered a cardiac arrest and none of the policemen tortured him.

The autopsy report [a copy available with Dawn] showed that Murtaza had torture marks on his body.

After the media reports about the findings of the autopsy, the police officials were suspended from service on Thursday. The swabs of Murtaza have been sent to the forensic lab to ascertain the cause of death.

Published in Dawn, October 19th, 2018