Six family members granted bail in polio team attack case

Six members of a family who were arrested on Friday for allegedly attacking polio workers and policemen in Korangi were granted bail on Saturday.

The suspects have been booked on the charges of assaulting and injuring three polio workers, including two women, when the volunteers, accompanied by cops, visited their home in the Korangi area to administer polio drops to the family's children on Friday.

Investigation Officer Mohammad Dilawar produced the suspects — Samina Khan, Mahjabeen, Amna Gul, Iqra Khan, Gul Khan and Ibrahim, alias Sufiyan - before two different judicial magistrates since three of them were minors and sought their 14-day physical remand in police custody for interrogation.

The IO informed that the suspects refused vaccination of their children and hurt the polio workers. He added that two shovels and one hammer that the suspects used to attack the polio team had been seized.

The officer said the suspects were required to be further interrogated about the crime and whereabouts of absconding suspects.

However, the magistrates declined the IO's plea for physical remand of the suspects and granted them bail against a surety of Rs10,000 each on the ground that the charges invoked against them were bailable. The IO was ordered to submit an interim charge sheet against them within the stipulated time.

An FIR was lodged at the Korangi police station under the sections 147 (rioting), 148 (rioting, armed with deadly weapon), 149 (every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence committed in prosecution of common object), 353 (assault or criminal force to deter public servant from discharge of his duty), 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty), 337-Ai (punishment for shajjah), and 186 (obstructing public servant in discharge of public functions) of the Pakistan Penal Code on behalf of the state through Head Constable Munib Qaiser.

The complainant stated that he and other policemen accompanied a polio team in Korangi No 2 Sector-20 when the family living there misbehaved with the polio workers. When the polio workers insisted that administering polio drops to children was important, the women got enraged and attacked them, he added.

Two men came out of the home and started beating the polio workers, the complainant said, adding that he and other policemen tried to save the polio team but the suspects attacked them as well, tearing their uniforms.