K-P govt wakes up to woes of Mashal Khan’s family

Lynching victim’s lawyer denies reports that he has quit the prosecution team

PESHAWAR: The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa government has finally woken up to the woes of the family of a young student who was lynched to death by fellow students on a university campus over blasphemy charges earlier this year.

Mashal Khan, a student of journalism and mass communication at the Abdul Wali Khan University in Mardan, was brutally lynched by a mob of fellow students in April for allegedly posting blasphemous content on his Facebook page.

The gruesome lynching captured by students on their mobile cameras and circulated on social media sparked a nationwide uproar, forcing the government to order a judicial inquiry into the sickening incident.



Interestingly, it transpired in the inquiry that the blasphemy charges against Mashal were ‘unfounded’.

Mashal’s family has been facing problems to pursue the case against the alleged killers. On Wednesday, the K-P government announced that it would bear all expenses to be incurred on pursuing the case. “Chief Minister Pervez Khattack has approved funds to pay the lawyers’ fees,” his office said in a brief statement.

The statement came hours after media reports claimed that one of the lawyers has decided to quit the prosecution team due to threats from the relatives of the accused.  The lawyer, Zafar Abbas, however, denied he has decided to quit.

“The media reports regarding from resignation from the prosecution team are baseless and fabricated,” Abbas told The Express Tribune. “I have not received any threats from anyone,” he said, calling the media reports ‘a pack of lies’.



Abbas said he was a member of the prosecution team but did not attend hearings on a regular basis because his presence was not needed in the case.

“My job is to assist the prosecutor pleading the case, if and when needed,” he said, adding that he had attended the hearing once when the trial first started to see arrangements in the jail where the case is being heard.

“Since then, I’ve been in Peshawar to continue my job in the Home and Tribal Affairs Department because senior lawyers and prosecutors are there to plead the case,” he added.

“I would attend the hearing wherever needed,” he said.  Mashal’s trial is being heard inside the district jail in Haripur.