RAWALPINDI: Police have solved the mystery of the murder of a hotel owner, whose charred body was recovered in his abandoned car close to a garbage dump in Morgah on Friday, and arrested three persons, including his second wife.

According to sources, among those allegedly involved in the murder of Mohammad Farooq, the owner of a hotel located off The Mall Rawalpindi, was his wife aged between 60 and 62 years, a housekeeper and the man who drove away the car containing the body to dump it at Morgah.

The sources said the motive behind the murder was lust for the property of the deceased.

Farooq, who was a dual national, had left his house on Thursday night but did not return.

The sources said Farooq was called by his wife, who married Farooq about 25 to 30 years ago and lived in Bahria Town. When he reached there, he was reportedly strangled by the man who had been taking care of her as she had promised him to arrange a job in the UK.

The sources said after Farooq was strangled, the main murder suspect asked one of his friends to take it to somewhere in Morgah.

The sources said Farooq’s body was put in the car which was driven to Morgah near the garbage dump.

The police with the help of CCTV footage traced the man carrying a petrol bottle which led to the arrest of the three persons.

Forensic experts and police launched an investigation into the case on different lines to ascertain the motive behind the murder and arrested the killers.

When contacted, City Police Officer Omer Saeed Malik revealed that police had received information from a security guard on March 31 that a car was burning in in a wooded area in Morgah.

During the initial investigation, the CPO said, a charred body was found in the burning car (RI-1889).

He said the SSP operations and the SP Potohar visited the scene and started an investigation on different lines and constituted four teams.

As the investigation was launched, the car owner was traced who turned out to be the owner of a hotel.

The CPO said the investigating teams identified the three suspects involved in the murder and arrested them The CPO said: “Murder was planned by the second wife of the deceased and got executed through two co-accused identified as Waheed and Idrees.”

Published in Dawn, April 5th, 2022