Cutting daughter into pieces for speaking up in Pak By Saba Imtiaz June 28, 2011 SAHIWAL: Dr Fazal Hussain

n Shah Shirazi once told his wife Abida Batool that the long knife he kept in his bag was to protect him against robbers, as he did not know how to use a gun. On June 4, he had used that same knife to stab their 17-year-old daughter Anum F atima while their four children watched. Disbelieving relatives went to the house to discover Anums body lying in a pool o f blood surrounded by hysterical siblings and a man who had calmly washed the kn ife and soaked his blood-stained clothes in a bucket. Shirazi confessed his crim e to his sister and fled Sahiwal after he realised that the police wanted to que stion him. Abida has not stopped crying since then. Her children, who cradled their dying s ister as blood gushed out, have been sent away to recover. Today, Abida speaks with almost manic energy and repeats the same question: Why my daughter? Why woul d he do this? Things started to sour soon after Dr Shirazi and Abida Batool married in 1992 in the watta satta tradition (Shirazis sister was married to Abidas brother). The Sh irazi family insisted that the differences in faith the Shirazis are Sunni and A bidas family is Shia would not be an issue. According to Abida, He constantly criticised my faith. I told him I would not pra ctice rituals. He was suspicious of who I met, so I cut myself off from my famil y. He wouldnt spend money on the house. I would ask my brother. But Abida Batool set aside all thoughts of divorce after Anums birth. Who would ma rry my daughter if I were divorced or separated? Four more children followed. So did problems. Shirazi barely contributed to fami ly expenses, Abida alleges. He enjoyed depriving his children and torturing them. Influenced by elder brother Dr Kareem Shirazi, he had no self-esteem. He would do whatever his brother said including practicing at the same clinic even though he made little money there. He barely went to the hospital he was posted at or attended to patients. The children lived in fear of him, since he could take off ense at the slightest thing. Questions about his income, Abida says, were answered by hurling abuse, and ofte n, blows to her head. That same anger also applied to matters of faith. While the Shirazis say they ar e Barelvi, Fazal Shirazi became avowedly anti-Shia. I have operated on senior, da ngerous mujahideen, he boasted to his wife. I wish I could go join them as well. Members of extremist organisations were regular visitors to his clinic. At one p oint, he stopped his wife from crying while watching news coverage of Lt Yasir A bbas, who was killed in the PNS Mehran Base attack. These soldiers have killed so many mujahideen, he said. Its only fair that they be killed too. While Abida says she raised her children as Sunnis, they were drawn to Shia ritu als. Anum would hide from her father and pray, but he had found her out twice an d threatened her with dire consequences. Anum had witnessed her parents turbulent marriage for 17 years. Abida recalls tha t Anum would comfort her, saying that once she started earning they could escape from this hell. After several years of silence, she had started arguing with her father, especially in support of her mothers demand that Shirazi build them a hou se, since they were living in one loaned to them by Shirazis older brother. I didnt want anything else, Abida recalls. Only a roof for my children. But that man wouldnt agree. On June 3, the couple fought bitterly over the issue of the house. Shirazi rose to strike her with a water jug, but Anum locked her mother into a room to protec t her from her fathers rage. She defended her mother, and in response, Shirazi re portedly yelled: I wont give you a house, Ill give you graves! Her father made true on his promise a few hours later. At around 4am, Shirazi stabbed his daughter, dragging her from one room to anoth er. Her siblings, awoken from their sleep, screamed at their father to stop. A s ervant, who lived upstairs, watched silently as the man cut his daughter to shred

s, according to Anums grandmother. By then, Abida had moved to her mothers house fo r the night, so that Shirazis rage wouldnt affect Anum, who was studying for her f irst-year examinations. Piecing together the events of that night has occupied Abidas family who speculat e that the two fought when Anum woke up to offer prayers. Other relatives said t hey could have fought over the house. Shirazi confessed his murder to his sister, but according to one account, he has been telling relatives that Anum was talking to a man late at night, which is w hy he killed her. The account appears inconsistent with investigations carried o ut by the police and family members. According to Dr Kareem Shirazi, who sought to separate himself from his brothers actions, This was basically a domestic fight. My brother and I are independent. The older Dr Shirazi also denied that his brother had anything to do with extrem ists. We believe in pirs and mureeds and those people destroy shrines! According to Abidas lawyer Mujahid Hussain, the police has been extremely coopera tive in investigating the case. A legal process may have been set into motion but tears continue to roll down Ab idas cheeks, who refuses to look at pictures of Anum or sift through her belongin gs. In the last few minutes before Anum died, she was studying for an Islamiat exam. Her books were scattered around her room when relatives found her body. Whether her father was riled by her faith, or her defence of her mother, is a secret th at Anum has taken to her grave, and her father carries around with him as he elu des the police. The house a source of such contention in the family has been str ipped bare of its belongings, but a blood stained mirror is a reminder of a 17-y ear-olds dying moments. http://tribune.com.pk/story/197882/tribune-exclusive-cutting-your-daughter-intopieces--for-speaking-up/ ------