Domestic maid beaten to death by employer in Pakistan

Lahore, Jan 20: A 14-year-old maid was allegedly beaten to death by her employer, a professor, for stealing money in Pakistan's Punjab province, police said today.

Fiza Batool, who died yesterday, was working for the last few years at the house of Salman Rashid, professor of English Literature in Islamia College. According to police, Rashid confessed that he hit the girl with a blunt object. The assault damaged her kidneys and lungs.

He claimed the maid used to steal money and he had no idea that she would die, Superintendent of Police Omer Riaz said. She was brought unconscious to the National Hospital by the professor on Saturday and later succumbed to her injuries.

Riaz said a murder case was registered against the professor on behalf of the state to save the girl's family from any pressure for reconciliation. A medical board's initial findings showed 13 internal and external injuries on the girl's body. The girl was apparently abandoned by her parents who have separated.

This is the third such incident in Lahore this month. Earlier, two teenage girls were killed by their employers, and one of them was sexually assaulted.

PTI