Police arrest suspects involved in kidnap of playwright Khalilur Rehman

Lahore: The Lahore police claimed on Monday to have arrested the culprits involved in the kidnapping of eminent playwright Khalilur Rehman Qamar. 

Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police Imran Kishwar in a presser with Khalilur Rehman Qamar said that the kidnappers had demanded Rs 10 million from the scriptwriter.

He said that the statement of the woman suspect, who invited Khalilur Rehman Qamar with an interest in producing a drama, has been recorded. She revealed that they used to trap high-profile people and were doing so for the past two years.

Earlier a day, Qamar had lodged a complaint against his abductors and requested the law-enforcement officials for help. 

Among those arrested are Amna Urooj, Mamnoon Haider, Zeeshan Qayyum, Javed Iqbal, Tanveer Ahmed, Falaksher, Qaiser Abbas, Rashid Ahmed, Mian Khan, Babar Ali, Shamail Bibi and Maryam Shahzai.

The DIG said that Amna confessed that they trapped the scriptwriter under the pretext of a drama-related project. The police also claimed to have recovered weapons, including Kalashnikovs, SMGs, pistols, and wireless sets, from the gang’s possession.

DIG Kishwar said that the suspects had deleted Khalilur Rehman Qamar mobile phone’s data in a bid to avoid their arrest, adding that the police were able to recover the data. “We arrested the prime suspect Amna Urooj by re-covering the data and later caught the rest of the accused,” said the DIG.

He continued that the suspects detained Khalilur Rehman Qamar for two hours, blindfolded, and dropped him at Nankana Sahib.

The Lahore police on Sunday registered a case on the complaint of eminent writer Khalilur Rehman Qamar that he was kidnapped and tortured.

According to the details, a woman named Amina had called Qamar to her house saying she wanted to make a drama and when he reached the woman's house, the armed men kidnapped him.

In the FIR, it is mentioned that the accused kept on torturing Qamar and kept moving him to different places, the accused threatened to kill him and asked him to request for more money from his relatives.