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Chained students found in madrassa
Source: Agencies |
December 14, 2011, Wednesday
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Police in the Pakistani city of Karachi have rescued 54 students from the basement of an Islamic seminary, or madrassa, where they said they were kept in chains by clerics, beaten and barely fed.
Police raided the Zakariya madrassa late on Monday on the outskirts of Karachi, Pakistan's commercial hub. They were now investigating whether it had any links to violent militant groups, which often recruit from hardline religious schools.
Most victims had signs of torture and had developed wounds from the chains, police said. The main cleric escaped during the raid.
"They were kept in such an environment like animals," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told journalists.
Many of the students - who varied in age from 15 to 45 and were kept 30 to a room - were still in chains while shown on television.
"I was there for 30 days and I did not seen the sky or the sun even once," Zainullah Khan, 21, said at a police station where the students were questioned and then released to relatives. "I was whipped with a rubber belt and forced to beg for food."
Student Mohi-ud-Din said: "I was kept in the basement for the past month in chains. They also tortured me severely during this period. I was beaten with sticks."
Senior police official Rao Anwar said many of those rescued were drug addicts brought to the seminary for treatment. "These people were not taken to the madrassa forcefully," he said.
One man was disappointed that his drug addict son had been rescued, as the madrassa was rehabilitating him.
"I wish my son could have stayed another four months," said Abdul Hafeez.
Police raided the Zakariya madrassa late on Monday on the outskirts of Karachi, Pakistan's commercial hub. They were now investigating whether it had any links to violent militant groups, which often recruit from hardline religious schools.
Most victims had signs of torture and had developed wounds from the chains, police said. The main cleric escaped during the raid.
"They were kept in such an environment like animals," Interior Minister Rehman Malik told journalists.
Many of the students - who varied in age from 15 to 45 and were kept 30 to a room - were still in chains while shown on television.
"I was there for 30 days and I did not seen the sky or the sun even once," Zainullah Khan, 21, said at a police station where the students were questioned and then released to relatives. "I was whipped with a rubber belt and forced to beg for food."
Student Mohi-ud-Din said: "I was kept in the basement for the past month in chains. They also tortured me severely during this period. I was beaten with sticks."
Senior police official Rao Anwar said many of those rescued were drug addicts brought to the seminary for treatment. "These people were not taken to the madrassa forcefully," he said.
One man was disappointed that his drug addict son had been rescued, as the madrassa was rehabilitating him.
"I wish my son could have stayed another four months," said Abdul Hafeez.
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