October 3, 2026
By Hashir Ahsan
ISLAMABAD
An 11-year-old boy, Khurram Ali, was murdered over an old dispute regarding a pathway through a plot. The incident took place within the jurisdiction of Naseerabad Police Station in Rawalpindi.
On the complaint of the victim’s father, the police have registered a case under murder provisions against the named accused, Kashif, and initiated an investigation.
The complainant, Muhammad Bilal, stated in his initial report to the police that he is a resident of Nizami Town, Imtiaz Market, New Chakra, Rawalpindi, and earns a living by making and selling flower garlands. They own a plot in Nizami Town where they have set up a jhuggi (hut). The complainant has 4 children (2 sons and 2 daughters), with the eldest being Khurram Ali (aged approximately 10 to 11 years).
FIR details
On 01-10-2026, around 3:30 PM, the complainant’s wife Sadia Bibi, daughter Ramsha, and son Hasnain Ali had gone to Sadar Bazaar, Rawalpindi, for work, while his son Khurram Ali was home alone. Around 7:00 PM, while passing by the complainant’s house, his brothers-in-law, Rashid and Majid, informed him, “Come home quickly, there is a problem.”
When the complainant reached home around 8:00 PM, his son Khurram Ali was lying dead on a charpoy inside the jhuggi. Rashid and Majid recounted that as they were passing by the jhuggi for work, they saw the accused, Kashif, running out of the jhuggi. Suspecting something amiss, they entered the jhuggi and found Khurram Ali dead, hung by a cloth noose attached to a wooden stick around his neck. They immediately brought the child down and placed him on the charpoy.
Motive for the Murder
According to the complainant, a few days prior, Kashif and others had blocked the pathway passing through their plot, leading to an altercation between the two parties. Due to this enmity, the accused, Kashif alias Kashu, unlawfully murdered their 11-year-old son Khurram Ali.
Speaking to Voicepk, the victim’s maternal uncle stated that the police have arrested the accused. He shared that the accused was their neighbor and that a fight had taken place a few days before the incident, after which the accused threatened them with dire consequences. The uncle further mentioned that to protect the accused, his relatives are claiming he is mentally unstable, but in reality, he is completely fine and mentally sound.
Police officials confirmed to Voicepk that the accused has been arrested and an initial investigation is underway. Police further stated that the victim’s autopsy report is still pending, after which the scope of the investigation will be expanded. According to the police, all evidence from the crime scene has been collected and will soon be sent to the laboratory for forensic examination.
While the crime of murder is on the rise day by day in Pakistan, the conviction rate for such heinous crimes in the criminal justice system has dropped to an alarming level of merely 18 to 20 percent, whereas nearly 80 percent of the accused are acquitted by taking advantage of technical flaws and the unavailability of evidence.
In a conversation with Voicepk, senior lawyer Amna Ali stated that the biggest reason behind this failure is the deficient and conventional mode of investigation by the police, which includes failing to secure the crime scene and relying solely on oral testimonies rather than forensic or scientific evidence. Apart from this, the lack of inter-departmental coordination between the prosecution and the police, the absence of an effective witness protection system, and the non-appearance of witnesses in court or contradictions in their statements are key factors that provide the benefit of doubt to the accused, leading to their acquittal.
Following the strict enforcement of the principle of testimony evaluation, “Falsus in Uno, Falsus in Omnibus” (false in one thing, false in all), by the superior judiciary, the complainant party’s habit of unnecessarily nominating innocent individuals ends up saving the actual killer as well. Unless the pressure and compromise made under the law of Qisas and Diyat in the Pakistan Penal Code are addressed and investigations are completely grounded on scientific principles, improvement in the conviction rate is not possible.
The shortcomings of this justice system can only be rectified by enhancing the capacity of the prosecution, providing modern training to investigating officers, and making the final scrutiny of the charge sheet (challan) by prosecutors mandatory before submitting it to the court.