Punjab Police spokeswoman Nabeela Ghazanfar told Reuters Baloch, whose real name is Fauzia Azeem, was killed in her family home in Multan, a large city in the Punjab province.
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25-year old Pakistani social media star, Qandeel Baloch was strangled to death by her brother on Friday in a so-called “honor killing” over the provocative images she posted of herself on social media.
Wasim Baloch stated to police: “Qandeel was bringing dishonour to the Baloch people and I could not tolerate that”. In a tweet posted the day before her death, Baloch said that women had to stand together. “I was determined either to kill myself or kill her“, he told the Associated Press. He added that he had acted alone and was unrepentant.
In Facebook posts, Ms Baloch, 26, spoke of trying to change “the typical orthodox mindset” of people in Pakistan.
“I thought I would expose him as he is in reality”, she told AFP at the time. “Girls are born only to stay at home and to bring honour to the family by following family traditions but Qandeel had never done that”.
In March, she claimed wide attention over her video post where she said she would be baring it all if the Pakistani cricket team wins their T20 match against India.
“Yes of course, I strangled her”.
Qandeel Baloch, believed to be in her twenties, had travelled with her family from Karachi to Muzzafarabad for the recent Eid holiday.
Pakistani relatives and residents carry the coffin of Ms Baloch during her funeral in Shah Sadar Din village.
Baloch tightly controlled her narrative in the media. Murder carries a potential death sentence, and the honor killing charge will make Azeem ineligible for a family pardon.
“The death of Qandeel Baloch conveys an insidious message: that women will be kept back at all cost; murdered, if they dare nurture ambitions to break the glass ceiling”, the English daily Dawn newspaper wrote in an editorial on Sunday. Her body was shifted to Nishtar Hospital in Multan around 2 pm Saturday afternoon and it remained there for more than 14 hours as her parents were coming to receive it after autopsy. “We are Baloch and as Baloch we can not tolerate [this]”, he said, speaking after his arrest.
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Over the last few weeks she stirred up a minor scandal by posting an Instagram photo of herself next to a senior Muslim cleric, Mufti Abdul Qavi, who was subsequently suspended from his post. The self-proclaimed model had also ridiculed the cleric on various television channels after the release of controversial content.
