Free will marriage: Plea dismissed after ‘victim’ testifies

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Thursday dismissed a petition for a woman’s recovery from alleged illegal detention following a kidnapping after she testified that she had not been abducted but had married the man of her own free will. The petitioner had alleged that her daughter Mehwish had been kidnapped by a man named Masood. She said that the family had arranged Mehwish’s nikah with her cousin Irfan. She asked the court to order her daughter’s recovery from Masood.  But Mehwish told the court on Thursday that she had no knowledge of the proposed nikah with her cousin and she had married Masood of her free will. She said that she was an adult and had the right to choose her own husband. The court accepted her testimony and dismissed the petition.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 19^th, 2013.