Perween Rehman murder case: JIT fails to find link between land mafia and OPP director's killers
A joint investigative team (JIT) formed to probe the motive behind the murder of Perween Rehman, the director of Orangi Pilot Project (OPP), Karachi, submitted a final report before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, DawnNewsTV reported.
In the report, the investigators observed that the land mafia clearly benefited from the murder of Rahman. However, they failed to establish any substantial link between the land mafia and Rahman’s killers.
During any murder probe, the first thing that merits investigation is who the greatest beneficiary would be from the victim's death, the report reads.
The OPP director was gathering data on Karachi's goths (areas which do not fall under the administration of any government body).
According to the report, the land mafia clearly benefited from the murder of Rahman. The activist was gathering data on Karachi's goths (areas which do not fall under the administration of any government body).
After Rahman's murder, documentation of data from the goths came to a halt. The documentation was meant to serve as a deterrent for the land mafia's land-grabbing attempts, as it would provide the residents with property rights.
Earlier in March, the JIT stated in its interim report that the linking of Qazi Bilal, believed to be a senior commander of the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan who was reportedly killed in a police encounter on March 14, 2013 — a day after the murder of Rehman — with the murder as prime suspect was in all probability false.
Rehman was going home from her office when unidentified assailants approached her car on a motorcycle on Manghopir Road near Banaras Flyover and opened fire. She received gunshot wounds in her neck and was rushed to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital by her driver where she died.
The JIT report contended that the JIT found the accounts of Sub-Inspector Ashfaq Baloch and former SHO of Peerabad police station Abdul Moeed about linking Qari Bilal with the murder simply unbelievable.
According to the report, Qari Bilal was probably killed over an internal dispute between Taliban factions but his body was subsequently picked up by the two police officials who claimed that he was killed in an encounter.