A medical examination was conducted on a six-year-old girl, who was allegedly abused by her guardians – her aunt and uncle were also sexually assaulted.
Preliminary results recorded in the medico-legal examination of the girl revealed that the girl was subjected to gruesome sexual violence and physical mutilation.
Further, the medical report stated that the victim had undergone severe psychological trauma.
Police Surgeon Dr. Sumia Syed said that after the examination of the victim, her treatment is going on.
DNA samples have been collected from the victim and sent to the forensic lab for further processing, he added.
The mother of the six-year-old girl said that three years ago, she had given the girl to her brother’s family for adoption. It was not immediately clear whether the girl’s aunt and uncle were also her legal guardians.
The woman alleged that her brother raped her daughter along with his friend. The girl’s mother claimed that she was also sexually assaulted.
However, Shah Latif Police Station decided to register an FIR first and then refer the victim to Jinnah Post Graduate Medical Center for medico-legal examination.
Furthermore, the police failed to formally produce the victim before a female medico-legal officer to ascertain whether the victim had allegedly been sexually assaulted and tortured.
In the FIR, Abdul Razzaq, the child’s second uncle, claimed that three years ago, his sister Alina, wife of Allah Danu, gave her three-year-old daughter to her brother Salman.
A few days ago, Aleena* – who lives in Larkana, received a call from Salman that her daughter was unwell. When she reached Salman’s residence on October 28, the child told her that her uncle, along with his wife Samreen and another person, whom she identified as Ghaffar, had stabbed her to death. injured him and scalded him by throwing hot water on him.
The child’s mother decided to register a case against her brother and later a case was registered against Salman at the Shah Latif Town police station. This includes Section 324 (attempt to murder), Section 337 (wounding), and Section 34 (acts by several persons in furtherance of common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code.
What Will Happen Next?
According to Pakistan’s criminal justice system, two FIRs cannot be filed for the same offense or sequence of criminal acts between a suspect and a victim.
In this particular case, the FIR filed does not currently include sections on sexual assault.
The only option left to the police now is to submit the medico-legal reports to the court and inform it about the sexual assault as done by the medico-legal team.
Moreover, the police may appeal to the court to include provisions for sexual assault in the case. If the court so directs, provisions relating to sexual assault will be included in the FIR.
After including sexual assault provisions in the FIR, the police will continue its investigation on those lines and submit a charge sheet before the court.
The court will then take the charge sheet into consideration and proceed with the case.
