By: Mohammad Asghar
RAWALPINDI: A father brutally hacked his divorced daughter to death in the city suburbs because he could not countenance her working in a beauty parlour, her siblings reported to police on Tuesday.
Police said Allah Ditta, the accused, was arrested and confessed to the crime. A blood-stained axe he was believed to have used to kill his 32-year-old daughter Shagufta, was also recovered.
“My father tied her to a tree in the jungle near our house and swung the axe at her neck, killing her instantly,” police quoted her younger sister as saying. In his statement recorded with the police her brother, Fiaz Ali, said the family lived in Gorakhpur village in Adiala suburbs and his father used to violently oppose Shagufta’s desire to accept an offer from the lady of the house where she worked as a maid, to work in the parlour that she ran.
“Last night, our father beat her up when she insisted on joining the parlour. Other family members intervened and the issue was settled for the time being,” the younger sister told the police. Shagufta had a little son and was divorced about three years ago.
As she woke up from her sleep, said the younger sister, she saw her father taking Shagufta away, holding a piece of rope and an axe in his hand. Scared and suspicious at this scene, she said she informed her brother.
Shagufta was taken away by her father to the nearby jungle where he allegedly tied her to a tree, abused her and then allegedly smashed her neck with an axe, killing her on the spot, according to the sibling.
Meanwhile, last Sunday two women were murdered in the name of honour in the city. In the first incident a woman identified as Hasrat Bibi was shot dead by her son-in-law in Khyban-e-Sir Syed. Hasrat Bibi’s daughter who had been married with Ali had returned to her mother’s house after disputing with her husband.
As he came to his in-laws’ house to convince his wife Mehwish to go with him, he got provoked as his in-laws refused to send their daughter with him, he pulled out his pistol and gunned down his mother in law. In another incident a woman identified as Sadaf Jabeen was shot dead by her husband Tanveer Ahmed outside Ayub Park.
