Tag: Domestic Torture

  • Another case of domestic staff torture surfaces in Islamabad

    Another case of domestic staff torture surfaces in Islamabad

    Islamabad police have arrested a woman after yet another case of torture on a minor working as domestic help in a house.

    Andaleeb Fatima, 13 was named as the victim in the FIR, filed by her mother, Khalida Bibi, a resident of Chiniot in Punjab. Andaleeb had been working for the accused woman since July of this year and according to her mother, she was unable to talk to her daughter since was not allowed to do so by her employer.

    It was only when Khalida Bibi visited Fatima after several unanswered calls that she found out about the torture inflicted upon her daughter. She found bruises on different parts of her daughter’s body. Fatima told her mother that her employer routinely beat her and tormented her with a hot spoon. She also locked her up and did not feed her food.

    On Khalida’s arrival, the employer locked mother and daughter in a room so that they are unable to speak against her. However, later, she released them from confinement and sent them off without Andaleeb’s salary.

    Andaleeb has been admitted in a hospital for medical examination while investigation into the case has been initiated. The registered case is based on the charges of 328-A (cruelty to a child), 342 (punishment for wrongful confinement) and 506 (punishment for criminal intimidation) under the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).According to Dawn.com, the accused was presented before a magistrate’s court and was later sent to Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi on judicial remand.

  • Justice delayed and denied

    Rizwana, a teenaged victim of domestic torture, awaits justice. Her case, with horrifying details of injuries, is being followed with great interest by the public, mainly because the main suspect, Somia Hafeez, is the wife of civil judge Asim Hafeez. Somia has been charged with allegedly physically torturing the girl, who worked as a maid in her home, after accusing her of stealing jewellery.

    But will the courts be fair in their judgement?

    In 2016, 10-year-old Tayyaba, working as a domestic worker, was severely tortured by her employees. Tayyaba, a native of Faisalabad, was living in Islamabad to work and financially support her family after her father lost a finger. The employers in question were Islamabad judge Raja Khurram Ali Khan and his wife.

    According to Dr. Tariq Iqbal, who was heading the medical board, the girl had “some burns, some traumas, some lacerations, some blisters [on her body]”.

    In April 2018, the couple was found guilty and sentenced to 12 months in jail. The sentence was increased to three years by Islamabad High Court in June 2018, following an appeal by prosecutors, with a Rs500,000 fine.

    However, in 2019, the verdict was reversed as Tayyaba’s lawyer claimed that no abuse was inflicted on the convict and that her bruises were “accidental” while the statement she gave in court during cross-examination was “memorised like a parrot”.

    Resultantly, in 2020, the apex court set aside the three year sentence and maintained the one-year jail term for the convicts.

    Like Tayyaba, will 14-year old Rizwana be left at the whims of power? Will she too one day say that the injuries she has, requiring surgeries and stays in ICU wards, were incurred accidentally?

    Will justice be served? Or delayed and denied once again?