KARACHI: A Pakistani mother has been arrested in Karachi after allegedly killing her two young children amid a dispute with her ex-husband, in a case that has shocked the country, police said on Thursday.
Child killings by mothers are rare in Pakistan. Experts say such incidents are often linked to mental health crises, family breakdowns, or domestic stress, underscoring the limited psychiatric and social support available for women facing marital disputes in the conservative South Asian nation.
According to a police report, the victims were identified as Zarar, 8, and Samia, 4, who died at their home in Karachi’s Defense Phase 6 area early on Thursday morning. Police said the mother was taken into custody at the scene and was being interrogated.
The woman’s former husband, Ghufran Khalid, told police she was “mentally ill,” according to the statement.
“A lady namely Adeeba Ghufran w/o Ghufran has killed her two kids ... cut the necks with sharp knife of her kids due to divorce issue with her husband,” Deputy Inspector General (DIG) South Karachi Syed Asad Raza said in a text message to Arab News.
He said the woman sent photographs of the children after the killing to her former husband, who then called the police helpline.
SSP South Mahzor Ali told Arab News the couple divorced last September, followed by a custody battle in which the court granted custody to the father. The children lived with him but visited their mother several days a week.
“Last night [Aug. 13], the children came from their father’s home to stay with their mother,” Ali said, adding that she allegedly killed them the next morning and then sent a video of the incident to her ex-husband, who immediately alerted police.
A rescue team found the children dead with their throats slit, and the mother was taken into custody. He said the father would file a police complaint after burying the children.
Research on cases where mothers kill their children, often described in criminology and psychology as filicide, points to multiple underlying causes.
Studies suggest that such acts are most commonly linked to severe mental illness, including postpartum depression, psychosis, or untreated psychiatric conditions; extreme domestic stress such as custody battles or marital breakdowns; or situations of social and economic isolation. In some instances, mothers report distorted beliefs that killing their children is an act of protection from perceived future suffering.
Experts caution that while these cases are rare, they often reveal gaps in mental health care and social support systems, particularly in societies where family breakdown carries stigma and couples have limited access to counselling or psychiatric treatment.
