Police on Saturday claimed to have arrested the prime suspect in the murder case of transgender Alisha, who breathed her last in Peshawar’s Lady Reading Hospital on Wednesday.
SSP Operations Abbas Majeed Marwat told media that the prime suspect in the case, Fazal Gujjar, was arrested from Peshawar’s Qazi village.
Alisha, a transgender activist working for Trans Action Alliance (TAA), was shot eight times, close to her one-room rented residence at Iqbal Plaza near Parda Bagh, Faqirbabad on Sunday night.
In her statement to police in hospital, Alisha had identified her killer as Fazal Gujjar, a resident of Bakhshoo Pull.
Alisha and her attendants had to go through a humiliating ordeal when the badly injured transvestite was taken to Lady Reading Hospital on Sunday night. The hospital staff and the attendants with the patients did not take them seriously and after failing to get accommodated in the male or the female ward, they were forced to get a private room in the hospital.
Later Alisha’s condition deteriorated and she was shifted to the ICU but she succumbed to her injuries and died on Wednesday morning.
Alisha’s murder was the fifth reported case of violence against trans people in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa this year. Other members of the TAA Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Adnan, Sameer, Komal and Ayesha were also targeted this year.
Meanwhile, a four-member committee was formed on Saturday at Peshawar’s Lady Reading Hospital (LRH) to probe hospital staff’s alleged negligence that led to Alisha’s death.
As per details, the authorities have collected evidence through CCTV footage and a final report will be presented on Tuesday.
Earlier on Friday, in the wake of Alisha’s death, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Minister Mushtaq Ghani announced that a comprehensive policy will be announced in the upcoming budget for the welfare of the transgender community