ISLAMABAD: A district and sessions court in Islamabad has issued an arrest warrant for Ayaz Amir, journalist and a former Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) MP, and his wife, Samina Shah, in connection with the murder of their daughter-in-law who was killed a day earlier.
Sara Inam, 37, a Canadian national, was bludgeoned to death in broad daylight allegedly by her husband and Amir’s son, Shahnawaz Amir, at a farmhouse in Chak Shahzad, a suburb of Islamabad that falls in the jurisdiction of Shahzad Town police station.
The police arrested the suspect from the crime scene on Friday and booked him the following day under Section 302 (punishment for murder) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) on the complaint of station house officer (SHO) Nawazish Ali Khan.
Inam was killed a day after she arrived from Abu Dhabi where she was working as a financial specialist. She got married to Shahnawaz three months ago in Chakwal, the hometown of Amirs. It’s believed the couple knew each other before marriage and the marriage was of their own choice, not arranged by their families.
On Saturday, the police presented Shahnawaz before District and Sessions Judge Mubashir Hassan Chishti and sought his 10-day physical remand. But the judge granted only two-day remand of the accused.
The police also requested the court for the issuance of arrest warrants for the suspect’s parents to record their statements, which was granted.
Interestingly, according to the first information report (FIR), Khan said it was the suspect’s mother who called the police and informed them that her son had killed his wife “with a dumbbell”.
“My son is present in the house and has hidden the body,” the report quoted Shah as saying. “He has locked himself up in his room. When they broke inside, there were stains of blood stains on Shahnawaz’s hands and clothes,” it added.
“He then confessed that he had repeatedly hit his wife with a dumbbell during an argument and then hid her body in the washroom’s bathtub.”
According to the FIR, Shahnawaz also said he had “hidden” the murder weapon under his bed.
On examining the dumbbell, the police found blood and hair on it. “We have sent it for forensics,” the FIR added.
The complaint further stated the victim’s body had been sent to the Polyclinic Hospital for a postmortem examination.
