By Staff Reporter
LAHORE: The entire staff of a police station in Lahore has been suspended after a woman said she was raped by an officer inside the building, in a case that has reignited concern over police conduct and the treatment of vulnerable people who come into contact with law enforcement in Pakistan.
More than 70 personnel attached to Ghaziabad police station were taken off duty on Tuesday, two days after the alleged assault, according to a police report. The move followed confirmation from a senior officer that a woman had identified the specific room in which she said she was attacked.
Faisal Kamran, Lahore’s Deputy Inspector General of Operations, said the woman, who is around 20 years old and has a mental impairment, had pointed out the location to senior officials in person. “The room was located on the upper floor of the police station,” he said.
The officer accused of carrying out the attack, an assistant sub-inspector attached to the station’s Investigation Wing, has not been named. Kamran said the alleged assault happened on Sunday, and that a first information report was lodged the following day.
The FIR was registered under Section 376 of the Pakistan Penal Code, which covers the offence of rape, alongside Section 155-C of the Police Order 2002, which addresses misconduct by police officers.
Explaining the scale of the suspensions, Kamran said police rules held every member of staff at a station responsible for guarding against wrongdoing on the premises, regardless of which unit they belonged to. “Anything that happens in a police station ultimately falls under the responsibility of the SHO,” he said, referring to the station house officer.
He said this applied even though the officer at the centre of the allegation worked for the Investigation Wing rather than the station’s Operations Wing, the unit more directly under the station house officer’s command. “Even though this incident involved the Investigation Wing, and the officer implicated was an ASI from the Investigation Wing, I considered it my personal responsibility to suspend the Operations SHO and the station staff,” he said.
Kamran said police stations in Lahore typically accommodate several different units under one roof, including the Operations Wing, the Investigation Wing, traffic police and other specialised departments, often split across different floors of the same building. “The Investigation Wing and the Operations Wing often work together in the same police station,” he said. “In fact, it is standard practice for one floor to be occupied by the Operations Wing and another by the Investigation Wing.”
He added that a medical examination would help determine whether the alleged rape had taken place, and that no one at the station had raised concerns when the officer brought the woman onto the premises. “No one bothered to enquire why the ASI had brought the woman to the police station in the absence of any female personnel,” he said.
According to the FIR, filed by the woman’s father, his daughter left the family home on Sunday afternoon and failed to return. As the family began searching for her, a man told them a police officer in civilian clothes had taken her away on a motorcycle.
The father said the family went to Ghaziabad police station that evening in search of his daughter, arriving at around 9pm. Moments after they got there, he said, his brother rang to say she had come home. When he arrived back at the house, he found his daughter in tears.
Asked what had happened, she told him a police officer had taken her away on his motorcycle and raped her, according to the FIR.
An investigation into the allegation is under way. Pakistani police have faced repeated criticism over the years for failing to properly investigate officers accused of abusing their position, and cases involving vulnerable complainants, including people with mental or intellectual disabilities, have drawn particular scrutiny from rights campaigners.
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