Mashal's suspected shooter confesses to his crime

In his statement, Imran says the incident wouldn't have happened if the university had expelled Mashal

PESHAWAR: The man suspected of shooting student Mashal Khan confessed to his crime before a senior civil judge in Mardan on Saturday.

The confession was submitted in the form of a statement to Judge Arbab Sohail Hamid.

In his statement, a copy of which is available with The Express Tribune, Imran, son of Sultan, said he had first met Mashal in 2014 at the Abdul Wali Khan University (AWKU) where they were both studying.

He maintained that he had tried to distance himself from Mashal because the latter advocated secularism and atheism.

On the day of the murder, he reached the university and found an angry mob trying to kill Mashal.

Imran added that he too wanted to murder Mashal like the other students in the mob.



"I went to my room, took my pistol and went looking for him. I found him running from the mob and shot him," the statement read.

"I didn't stay there after that and don't know what happened next," he maintained.

Imran also held the university's administration responsible for the incident. "If they [the administration] had expelled Mashal, it wouldn't have led to such a situation," he said.

"The university's administration comprises incompetent employees who have been appointed on the basis of nepotism," he added.

The accused further stated that the university was being run like a "club" and its officials approved of Mashal's actions.

"I have no regrets. After I was arrested, I even showed my pistol, which I used to kill Mashal, to police without hesitating," he added.



Mashal, a 23-year-old student of journalism at the AWKU, was shot dead and brutally lynched on campus on April 13 after accusations of blasphemy.

Videos of the gruesome incident show agitated students stomping on Mashal’s lifeless, blood-soaked body and hitting him with sticks. More videos that have surfaced since then show a local PTI councillor Arif Mardan congratulating the students for killing the student and urging them to pledge to not reveal the identity of the shooter.

DPO Mardan police Dr Mian Saeed told The Express Tribune that 47 suspects of a total 49, who were identified with the help of CCTV footage, had been arrested.