The parents of Pakistani Kashmiri convicted killer Shafqat Hussain, pray as they sit with relatives in Muzaffarabad. PHOTO: AFP
“Executions can take place anytime. But a man’s life once taken can’t be returned,” said Ahmed. His reason for deferring the hanging was in light of the Supreme Court hearing scheduled for Tuesday morning – four hours after Shafqat was to be executed.
“There was reasonable doubt. And there was the Supreme Court hearing scheduled the same morning is why I decided to stay the hanging,” he told The Express Tribune.
The death-row prisoner was sentenced to death by an anti-terrorism court in 2004 for kidnapping and murdering a seven-year-old boy.
The superintendent invoked Article 104 (ix) of the Pakistan Prisons Rules that states: “In the event of its coming to knowledge of the Superintendent at any time before the execution of the sentence that altogether exceptional circumstances have arisen which plainly demand a reconsideration of the sentence, he is at liberty, anything in the foregoing rules notwithstanding, to report the circumstances by telegraph to the Provincial Government and ask for its orders and to defer execution till they are received.”
After receiving permission from his seniors and the Sindh Home Department, Ahmed decided to stay the execution, hours before Shafqat was to be sent to the gallows.
Since January, this is the fourth time that his hanging has been postponed because of doubts cast over his age.
Though the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) had concluded that Shafqat was not a minor at the time of the offence, his family and lawyers insist that he was a juvenile and that the authorities had not determined his age.
His lawyers at the Justice Project Pakistan (JPP) expressed their pleasure over the stay, but they said they were clueless about how much time he has. “All our hopes now lie with the Supreme Court hearing,” said a JPP spokesperson.
The lawyers are now challenging the FIA’s report, saying that the proof of his parents’ IDs, affidavits and his school records were ignored by the agency.
Shafqat’s plea adjourned
The Supreme Court postponed on Tuesday the hearing of Shafqat’s appeal against the Islamabad High Court’s verdict that had dismissed his plea for setting up a judicial commission to determine his age.
A three-judge bench of the apex court, headed by Chief Justice Nasirul Mulk, will take up Shafqat’s plea again on Wednesday (today).
During Tuesday’s hearing, the applicant’s counsel Dr Tariq Hassan said he had read in a newspaper that his client’s execution was halted. He sought time to verify the information, following which the bench adjourned the hearing till today.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 10th, 2015.
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