With the arrest and confession of the culprits police claims to have solved the murder case of BMO Shopian Dr Masood but don’t divulge the motive behind it. Mir Iqbal reports.
Every day Dr Masood would return home from his clinic at Korel village near Wattoo of District Kulgam at 5:00 pm. On March 25, he did not. His family contacted him on phone and the doctor told them that he was going with some people to attend to their patient.
After a while his family tried to reach him on phone again but the phone had been switched off. As Dr Masood failed to return or contact them the family was worried. In the morning his tortured body was found inside his car near Memander village.
The car had been pushed down a slope on a blind curve to portray it an accident. The family could only see the body when it was brought to their home in Sofanam village on the road connecting Shopian with district Pulwama.
Masood’s family members register an FIR against unknown person(s) in police station Shopian.
Within a few days Police apprehended Mudasir Ahmad Lone, when he used the slain’s cell phone which Dr Masood was carrying when he went missing. Later the same phone was sold to an outside labourer, who is also in police custody.
“The accused was traced with the help of cell phone which he has taken away from Dr Masood. Within no time we raided Mudasir’s house at Matribug and arrested him on spot,” said Station House Officer Shopian Javaid Ahmad, who is investigating the case.
Later police also arrested Sartaj Ahmad Naikoo and Mohammad Abbas Bhat residents of Chek Matribug and Mohammad Altaf Lone of Kutpore.
Abdul Jabar Bhat, father of one of the accused, Abbas, said that his son told him in the police station that “They used the bikes of Sartaj and Altaf and caught hold of the doctor at Manzgam village. Sartaj and Mudasir boarded the doctor’s car and forced him to drive the car on their instructions. They brought him to an orchard near Matribug Chek and tied him to a tree to threaten him”.
Zahoor Ahmad, son of the murdered doctor says that his father was killed for money.
“The cash, credit card, cell phone and other valuables which he was carrying were stolen. There were preparations of our sister’s marriage. So, he had some money on him,” Zahoor said.
The slain’s other son, Arshad said, “The murder of Doctor Sahib was planned.” With tears rolling down his cheeks Arshad said that since Doctor Sahib was in late fifties and was suffering from many ailments like diabetes, gallbladder stone, prostate enlargement, he did not put up with the torture.
“After God it is the Doctor who can go beyond the privacy of a person. He should not be treated like this. They did not spare him even after rendering decades of service to the people. How good can society expect from these persons,” said one of his regular patients who had come to take medicine prescribed by Dr Masood.
Sartaj’s family members said, “When police was looking for him, he told us, ‘Doctor (Masood) was only saying that do not degrade my image in public, my daughter is getting married soon, and his heart failed. And he died on spot. Then we put his body in his own car and left it at Memander’.”
Mohammad Ayoub Naikoo elder brother of murder accused Sartaj said, “They only wanted to threaten him, because of his misbehavior with our two sisters. If they had any plan of killing him they would not have brought him to the orchard and tied to a tree. It was unintentional death.”
However, the police maintain that they have found that it was an intentional murder.
SHO Javaid Ahmad said, “We visited the orchard where Masood was put to death and recovered the undershirt, rope and sticks from the spot, which means his clothes were removed, tied to a tree and was tortured. All the proofs have been collected. It was an intentional death (murder).”
Basher Ahmad Lone one of the accused Mudasir’s father said, “My son was lured by Sartaj and took him to the place where doctor’s body was laying dead, seeing this my son refused to drive the car, but they threatened him. Because no one among them knew driving and hence they called my son”.
As the investigation is going on police refuse to divulge further details or the reasons behind the murder. “Disclosing the information will be possible only in the court,” police said.
