In many instances, it has been said by the police and courts themselves that the law has been misused by people.
JUBAIL, SAUDI ARABIA: Who says Ziaul Haq died a quarter century back; no he didn’t — at the very least, his legacy is alive and well. His sellout of Pakistan to act as a surrogate to facilitate those who fought inside Afghanistan with the help of American weaponry and dollars, has become a never-ending misery for Pakistanis. One of his legacies was the Eighth Amendment, especially the formal introduction of laws such as those relating to blasphemy.
Since the passage of the law, hardly any one person has been executed under it -– however, what has happened is that dozens of people suspected of having committed an act of blasphemy have been killed, usually by charged mobs. Those killed have included not only the alleged blasphemers but also civil rights workers, lawyers, judges, and police officers working on such cases. In many instances, it has been said by the police and courts themselves that the law has been misused by people to drive out minority communities in an attempt to grab land and so on.
According to a report in your newspaper, the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) has now been discussing the award of death penalty to anyone who falsely accuses someone else of having committed blasphemy. For some people this may be an attempt to make the law a bit balanced, however, I don’t think any such amendment will make any difference on ground given that many such cases are ‘settled’ by mobs before reaching the police or the courts.
Masood Khan
Published in The Express Tribune, September 22nd, 2013.
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