Supreme Court takes notice of Kohistan incident

The Supreme Court of Pakistan on Monday took suo moto notice of the alleged killing of seven people including five women as a punishment for dancing at a wedding party in Kohistan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK).

A video scandal was recently emerged in which the death decree was issued to seven persons by the clerics of Kohistan.

Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry ordered Attorney General Irfan Qadir to collect details of the incident from Chief Secretary KPK. At the same time, the court issued notices to Commissioner Hazara Division, DPO Kohistan and DIG Hazara to appear before the court.

Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry ordered the Attorney General during the hearing of Asghar Khan’s case.

He also ordered the attorney general to find out the five girls, who were sentenced to death by the local cleric over clapping and dancing in a wedding ceremony along with two men, and submit a report to the court.

The chief justice remarked, “The court has repeatedly declared that decisions issued by private jirgas (tribal courts) are illegal and unconstitutional”.

According to the police officials, local clerics in Kohistan sentenced five women and two men to death after mobile phone footage emerged of them enjoying themselves at a village.

According to them, these people had allegedly danced and sang together in defiance of strict tribal customs that separate men and women at ceremonies.

Conflicting reports about the killing of the accused women are making the rounds in media from the last two days.

The religious scholars in District Kohistan on Saturday termed the video scandal as baseless and said that no death decree was issued in the case. Muhammad Afzal, the brother of the accused men, however, sought help from the government in this regard.

Provincial Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain also termed the news regarding killing of women of Kohistan completely wrong and baseless.

He observed, “I have talked to the DCO Kohistan, the DIG Hazara and Home Secretary and they have termed the reports about the incident baseless”.

Short URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=24661

Posted by Faisal Farooq on Jun 4 2012. Filed under Pakistan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.