Child rapist given life imprisonment in Pakistan

Seminary teacher convicted for raping a six-year-old girl. PHOTO: AFP

A man in Karachi, Pakistan was sentenced to life imprisonment on Tuesday after being convicted him of raping a child four years ago.

The case was reported in 2011, when a six-year-old girl complained about bleeding to her family, who took her to a doctor. When asked about what had happened, she explained that a seminary teacher Tahir had lured her onto the rooftop of a mosque in the area.

The girl identified him while two neighbors also revealed that they had seen him taking her upstairs. Consequently, the police took Tahir into custody. During the trial, Tahir pleaded innocence and denied the charges against him, but the victim’s testimony and the medical report acted as evidence against him.

On Tuesday, he was found guilty of rape after the court scrutinized the evidence and sentenced him to jail for 25 years. The judge also ordered him to pay a fine of Rs50, 000 to the victim’s family, failing which he would have to undergo an additional jail term of three months.

The case was pursued by War Against Rape (WAR), a non-governmental organization working for sexually abused women and children. According to a recent report by the organization, 383 cases of rape were reported in the city last year, of which only 106 cases were filed with the police for prosecution. Furthermore, while around 3,242 medical examinations for sexual assault were conducted in Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, Civil hospital and Abbasi Shaheed Hospital between 2005 and 2014, FIRs were only registered for 1,101 cases.