Transgender group accuses Islamabad police of blackmailing

RAWALPINDI: A transgender group in Islamabad has accused police of blackmailing in order to gain illicit relations.

According to details, Islamabad police lodged FIR against transgender gender, Sanam Baluch after she refused police demand to illicit relations.

Talking to MM News, Sanam Baloch said, “Khurram, a police officer of I-Nine police station in Islamabad, arrested me a few days ago for begging and will take me to the police station.” Sanam Baloch alleged, “The policeman abused and tortured me after talking police station.”

The transgender person further said that the policeman also beat other persons of his community after she called them for help. The transgender claimed the men filmed them and tore their clothes, adding they can easily identify the policeman.

Sanam Baloch said the police kept him in the police station for eight days, later they sent him to Adiala jail but was not produced in court,” Baloch added.

Sanam Baloch said that in addition to the lawyers’ fees, she had spent about Rs 150,000 on the cases, then she was granted bail however policeman Khurram kept threatening him still.

Transgender persons of Islamabad and Rawalpindi had staged a protest earlier outside the National Press Club against the rise in incidents of violence against their community members and demanded protection by the government.

The protest was organized to highlight the plight of the community in the country, which according to many protesters was not being taken seriously by the police administration.

Shouting slogans against the provincial government and police for failing to protect them, the transgender persons said that they were facing injustice in the country and the law enforcement agencies were not taking any action in this regard.

The protestor further said that not only was there hate against transgender persons in society, it also became more dangerous when it escalated from ridiculing them in public like cutting their hair or beating them up to brutally killing them.

The protesters claimed that in most such cases, killers weren’t arrested, cases were not properly probed to arrest culprits, or strong cases weren’t made against them.