LHC verdict

Issue needs to be urgently addressed, misuse of blasphemy law prevented so that it can't be used to victimise people

The country’s controversial blasphemy laws, put in place in 1986 under General Ziaul Haq, are in focus once again. The Lahore High Court (LHC) has upheld the death sentence meted out to the Christian mother of five, Aasia Bibi, who was in 2009, accused of blasphemy in Nankana Sahib and sentenced to death by a district and sessions court in 2010.

The ruling by the two-member LHC bench was not unexpected. Acquittals are rare in blasphemy cases, in part because of the pressure exerted by extremist groups. A cleric had brought the charges against Aasia Bibi after women who worked with her in a field as labourers claimed she had committed blasphemy. Aasia Bibi herself has always denied this and said the matter stemmed from a dispute over fetching water from a well, with the other women saying that as a non-Muslim, she was not fit to do so.

The Aasia Bibi case accelerated into a series of terrible events. In 2011, the then Punjab governor, Salmaan Taseer was murdered by his own bodyguard for speaking out in her favour. The then minister for religious affairs, Shahbaz Bhatti was also killed some months later. The controversy continues. Aasia Bibi’s fate still lies in the balance. She has said that she will now take her appeal to the Supreme Court. Given the doubts that exist over the entire chain of events, we can only hope that justice finally prevails.

Too often, the climate that has been created around the blasphemy issue and the emotion that surrounds it has prevented this from happening. Aasia Bibi deserves a truly fair trial. She also deserves humane treatment. For over five years, she has been kept in a tiny, box-like cell, isolated from human contact for fear that other jail inmates could attack her. This has happened to other persons accused of blasphemy. Some have been killed in their cells or while still on trial. The issue needs to be urgently addressed and the misuse of the blasphemy law prevented so that it cannot be deployed to victimise people over small arguments, misunderstandings or prejudices.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 19^th, 2014.

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