In a shocking incident, guests attending a wedding at a marriage hall in Pattoki in Punjab’s Kasur district mercilessly beat to death a poor street vendor and continued to enjoy the festivities and food while his corpse lay nearby on the floor.
Kasur police said that a group of wedding guests attacked papad vendor Ashraf Sultan on suspicion that he was a pickpocket. It said the wedding guests left the man’s dead body on the floor inside the wedding hall as they continued with their dinner and festivities.
According to the FIR [First Information Report] registered by Sultan’s brother-in-law, five to six people beat his relative outside the Al-Jannat wedding hall in Pattoki. The suspects reportedly clashed with the street vendor over the purchase of some rice crackers.
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“We went and started pleading [with] the people who were beating him [to stop]. They dragged him inside the wedding hall,” the complainant stated in the FIR.
Pattoki Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Asif Hanif said that the incident was ‘very unfortunate’ and that police were interrogating 13 suspects.
The murder garnered widespread condemnation on social media after a video of the incident went viral on social media.
Beyond shocked to see a poor Papparwala who was mercilessly beaten to death in a marriage hall in #pattoki & people enjoying & eating dinner while his corpse lay nearby on the floor. Hum ab Zinda Quom nahi but we are a dead Nation. Shame on Us. Astagfirullah #pdmmafiaexposed pic.twitter.com/C3ZJIGFb00
— Mishi khan (@mishilicious) March 22, 2022
SHAME ON HUMANITY #pattoki pic.twitter.com/OURnkIMy60
— Qazi Tufail (@mohquaz) March 22, 2022
After watching #pattoki I Realized. pic.twitter.com/GxnoguN0mh
— Peaky Blinder . (@Trucker_61) March 22, 2022
As a nation, we have reached the lowest level of ignorance.
A man is lying dead in the wedding hall and people are busy eating.😭😭😭
The system can be fixed later,
First this nation needs to be fixed#pattoki#کہاتھاپہلےنظام_بدلو pic.twitter.com/8TasgeMCLz— Waqas Akhter (@waqasakhter077) March 22, 2022
#pattoki Incident is the Clear Example Of How As A Nation We Are Standing Today On The Moral, Social And Religious levels, Everyone Of Us Is Trying To Use Full Capacity Of Power He or She Have On The People Working Below Him. 😔 pic.twitter.com/k0rsJSt0VD
— Noon (@Bedaar99) March 22, 2022
Okay I’m convinced. There’s no hope for this nation. Today my optimism runs dry. We deserve the worst and it’s coming to our doorsteps very soon.
Unbelievable, shameful and sad. Better to be dead than alive in a soul-less nation. RIP
May Allah protect us.
— Rohail Hyatt (@rohailhyatt) March 22, 2022
Street vending is a common, if precarious, livelihood for many of Pakistan’s poor. In 2020, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE), Centre of Street Economy (CSE) and Social Protection and Poverty Alleviation Division drafted a bill to regularise and safeguard the rights of street vendors.