A district and sessions court in Islamabad approved on Tuesday the interim bail of a civil judge’s wife, Somia Asim, till August 7 in the maid torture case. She is accused of beating and torturing her 13-year-old maid.
Additional Sessions Judge Abida Sajjad granted the bail after the accused submitted Rs100,000 worth of surety bonds.
Earlier in the day, Somia Asim filed sought a pre-arrest bail in the maid torture case.
“The allegations are baseless, concocted, and the result of exaggerations,” said the application filed in the district and sessions court on Tuesday. “No doubt the victim Rizwana used to work in the house of petitioner but the remaining story is not the one that has been reported by the complainant and posted by police in FIR.”
Read: Maid torture case: Doctors reveal Rizwana was poisoned
The first information report contains criminal intimidation, wrongful confinement, and cruelty to child charges.
Somia in her petition claimed that she was innocent and would provide a detailed version of her innocence to the investigation officer.
“The victim who is aged more than 17 years was always dealt with by the petitioner with kind and soft heart in the same manners as she used to deal with her own three children aged 9-12,” said the petition.
The complainant, who is the father of the victim, has claimed that his daughter was badly wounded when he visited her at the house of the civil judge at the Zarta Housing Society. She was working at a salary of Rs10,000 per month.
Read: Case filed against judge’s wife for brutally beating up minor house help
Somia’s application added that since the employment of the victim and before the alleged occurrence every moment of the victim and before the alleged occurrence every moment went “normal and there was no complaint at all about any kind of torture or harassment” on the part of the petitioner.
Against this background, it added that the petitioner’s claims appeared to be true.
“The involvement of petitioner in the case is based on malafide and ulterior motive,” it said.
The application added that Somia’s arrest would have an “irreparable loss to the petitioner’s dignity”. She expressed her intention to join the investigation when required by the police.
Manga Khan, father of the maid, in his complaint, said that he sent her daughter Rizwana Bibi, 13, to the house of the civil judge at the Zarta Housing Society six months ago to work at a salary of Rs10,000 per month.
Read: Maid torture case: Islamabad police add ‘cruelty to child’ charge in FIR
“On Sunday, he along with her wife, and brother-in-law came to Islamabad to meet her at the house of the judge and found the girl crying and in deteriorated condition,” it said.
The victim was badly wounded, the complaint said, adding that her ribs were also fractured and marks of injuries were found on her back.
When Khan asked her daughter about the abuser, Rizwana said that she was allegedly tortured by the judge’s wife on a daily basis and the employer also refused to give her food at times. She said she was detained in a room.
But the civil judge has denied such accusations and blamed the girl for injuring her head by herself.
