Police arrest main suspect in transgender woman’s murder in Swat

Adnan Bacha
Swat: A man was arrested in Swat on Sunday late at night over his alleged involvement in the murder of a transgender woman, identified as Mahnoor, police sources said on Monday.

According to the details main suspect, identified as Nawab, was arrested by the Swat on Sunday late night. The Malakand Region Police spokesperson said that following the murder a special police team was constituted under the supervision of RPO Sajjad Khan and DPO Shafiullah Gandapur, who arrested the main suspect within 10 hours after the murder.
DPO Swat Shafiullah Gandapur said that transgender persons are an important part of the community and that full justice will be provided to them. The victim transgender was buried in Swat as the victim’s family had refused to accept the body for burial, police sources said.
It is pertinent to mention here that transgender person, Muhammad Osama alias Mahnoor, was shot dead on Saturday night when he was on his way home after performing at an event.

The murder suspect along with other associates when the murder suspect intercepted them at Taj Chowk in Mingora and opened fire at them. As a result, Mahnoor died on the spot and another transgender named Gulalai was injured.
The funeral prayer of the deceased was performed on Sunday. It was the first time that the funeral prayers of a transgender were attended in large numbers by the people of the area, including police officers.The transgender community says that we have full faith in the police to get them justice.
“If justice is neglected, we will come out for the strong protest,” they added
Another transgender Saba while speaking to The PenPK.com said that Mahnoor and the murder suspect, Nawab, were friends. Nawab had forbidden Mahnoor from dancing, on Saturday night when Mahnoor was on the way home Nawab shot him dead.
According to Saba, Mahnoor’s relatives who are living in Karachi when informed they refused to participate in the funeral of the deceased.
According to Transgender Alliance Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, this is the second incident of this year in which a transgender has been killed while 100 transgenders have been killed since 2015.
Transgender Alliance Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa  President Farzana Riaz said “The police have fully cooperated with us in this incident and we hope that the accused will be brought to justice.”
The local people in a large number attended the funeral prayer of the deceased as well as people are also coming to recite Fatiha for Mahnoor, adding that the most optimistic thing was that the local imam didn’t hesitate to offer the funeral. However, Farzana Riaz said, likewise other transgender persons’ families, the family of Mahnoor also refused to accept the body.

In the previous cases also, the relatives of transgender persons did not accept the bodies for burial but later their family members signed agreements with the accused in exchange for money and declared them their opponents. Farzana said, “We fulfilled every obligation from filing a case to burial rituals of the victims.”
“We registered a case against the accused, we made arrangements for burial, but we were not included in the agreements,” Farzana further added.

The civil society of Swat has also condemned the killing of transgender persons and has demanded from the top police officers that the arrested accused should be severely punished so that such actions can be prevented in the future.