On September 16, a Hindu Pakistani woman, Nimrita Kumari, a student of Bibi Aseefa Dental College (BADC) was found dead in Chandika Medical College Hostel in Larkana city in Sindh Province, Pakistan. 

The reason and circumstances that led to the young doctor’s death were subjected to many conspiracy theories from the beginning. Nimrita Kumari was a resident of Ghotki in Sindh – a region infamous for atrocities on the religious minority, where abduction of Hindu girls by Islamists has become an everyday thing.

However, the intellectuals and liberal media that stay invested in painting a rosy picture of Pakistan run by their favorite poster boy of Islamic benevolence, Imran Khan, relegated the incident as a regular mishap. College admin and SMBBMU Vice-Chancellor (VC) Aneela Atta Ur Rahman had tried to brush off the cold blooded murder as a suicide case. Shameful to say the least, it compels us to wonder who the staff of the Bibi Asifa Dental College were trying to protect. 

According to media reports, a local court judge even declined to hold a judicial probe into the death of Nimrita Kumari despite orders from the home department. “Neither the (bereaved) family is coming forward to lodge a FIR of the incident nor are the police ready to register a suicide case” read the report. This exposes the shambles in which the Pakistani judicial system runs, and the fear clouding the minds of minorities living in Pakistan that a family finds itself threatened to even lodge an FIR demanding justice for their daughter.  

The mysterious death of the 25-year-old student, however, was met with huge public uproar with angry people holding protest rallies and demanding judicial intervention, despite college authorities and courts scheming to have the issue slighted and forgotten.

A Hindu lawmaker raised this issue in the Parliament of Pakistan and sounded out his concern on the continuous brutalities heaped on Hindu girls, their abduction, forced conversions, and marriages, and questioned the Imran Khan government on the raising atrocities on Pakistan’s religious. “How long will Hindus here have to pick up corpses? How long will our temples keep burning?” asked the law maker in the general assembly. 

In the face of massive province-wide protests and outrage, the Sindh government was forced to initiate a thorough probe into the mysterious death of Nimrita Kumari. 

The final autopsy report issued on Wednesday by the Chandka Medical College Hospital reads, “The ligature marks also tally with the information. Such signs are produced either in strangulation or hanging and are to be ascertained through circumstantial evidence as corroborative at the crime scene by state investigation authorities.”

The autopsy establishes the presence of male DNA profile specified from semen residue on the deceased student’s clothes. Further, a vaginal swab tested positive for a forced sexual act – this confirms that the deceased was sexually assaulted before being murdered. 

According to Dr Amrita, the Medico-Legal Officer of the hospital, Nimrita’s death was caused by suffocation. “Such signs are produced either in strangulation or hanging and are to be ascertained through circumstantial evidence as corroborative at the crime scene by state investigation authorities,” she stated.

Police Surgeon Dr. Abbasi confirmed that as noted in the post-mortem report, the wound marks on Nimrita’s neck were “narrower in width” which could be caused by a rope-like thing and not a dupatta. 

These reports challenge the claims of suicide produced by the college authorities, and corroborates the statement made by Nimrita’s brother, Dr. Vishal, who had rubbished the ‘suicide’ narrative. He maintained that Nimrita was a jovial person and wouldn’t have taken such an extreme step. 

The police have detained over 30 suspects, including two of the Nimrita’s classmates, Mehran Abro and Ali Shan Memon, after tracing Nimrita’s call data from her cell phone. “Their cell phones and laptops are being examined. The two had deleted around 40 text messages exchanged with the victim. An examination of the girl’s phone revealed those conversations,” confirmed the police. Further investigations are still underway.

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