A Pakistani court sentenced Pervaiz Masih, a Protestant Christian, to death, after he was accused of penning 'blasphemous' content that allegedly ignited riots in the Jaranwala region.
(LifeSiteNews) — On April 18, Good Friday, a Pakistani court sentenced Pervaiz Masih, a Protestant Christian, to death, after he was accused of penning "blasphemous" content that allegedly ignited riots in the nation's Jaranwala region in August 2023.
According to Christian Daily, Masih had been previously charged under Pakistan’s widely denounced Islamic "blasphemy" statutes, “including 295-A against inciting religious sentiments under various sections; 295-B against desecrating the Quran; 295-C against insulting Islam’s prophet; 120-B against criminal conspiracy; 34 against acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention; 37, which cites vicarious liability due to mutual cooperation; and Section 9 of the Anti-Terrorism Act of 1997 against offenses related to the possession or use of explosives or other terrorist-related materials.”
Judge Javed Iqbal Sheikh imposed the death penalty to Masih under section 295-C of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) and sentenced him to a decade in prison, with a total PKR 3 million fine as per section 295-A of the PPC.
Nonetheless, the court acquitted two other suspects — Daud William and Shahid Aftab — for lack of sufficient evidence incriminating them. Both William and Aftab were hitherto denounced for allegedly aiding Masih in creating content to falsely accuse two brothers, named Umair Saleem and Umer Saleem, of blasphemy.
Attorney Nadeem Hassan of legal aid organization Christians’ True Spirit, who represented Aftab and William, stated that prosecutors were unable to show that Aftab and William had aided Masih in fabricating blasphemous content.
“William and Aftab are Masih’s relatives. It was alleged that William had downloaded and printed the photographs of the two brothers, Rocky and Raja, and given it to Masih who used them with the blasphemous content. Aftab was accused of helping Masih in writing the alleged blasphemous content in his house. However, the court admitted our arguments that there was no direct evidence against the two Christians,” Hassan said.
In response to the verdict, Christians slammed the court’s decision as too harsh, with many pointing out the lack of justice for Christians injured in the violence led by Islamists in Jaranwala in 2023. At that time, anti-Christian Muslim attackers razed various church buildings and ransacked over 80 Christian homes and businesses, Christian Daily reported, in response to Christians allegedly writing "blasphemous" content and desecrating the Quran.
“… We saw our houses in complete shambles, like the building would soon collapse. And to date, we have received no support. It has been a year, my husband is unemployed, because no one hires him (due to stigma). Many people received the promised compensation of 2 million rupees (US$7,200), but we did not receive it,” Khalida Bano, a Christian woman from Jaranwala said, in remarks quoted by Amnesty International.
In a Facebook video, Ghazala Shafique, a Karachi-based rights activist, declared:
The court has convicted a Christian for allegedly carrying out the alleged blasphemous act, but what about those people who burned our churches and homes and are now roaming freely on bail? Why didn’t the police and prosecution investigate those cases with the same zeal that they have shown in Masih’s case?
Likewise, a Protestant pastor from the Church of Pakistan contended that Masih’s verdict was a twisted “Easter gift to the Christians from the Punjab government.”
The pastor asserted that the court ruling threw cold water on Easter celebrations for Christians already bearing the consequences of government inaction against anti-Christian attackers in Jaranwala.
As of the present moment, only a dozen suspects of the over 300 attackers arrested are facing trials in an anti-terrorism court, the chairman of the Minorities Alliance Pakistan, attorney Akmal Bhatti, said.
“A majority of the suspects have either been bailed out or were discharged from the cases due to defective police investigation,” Bhatti added.
According to figures by Amnesty International cited by Christian Daily, out of 5,213 suspects, just 380 have been arrested.
“Of the arrested suspects, 228 were released on bail and 77 others had the charges against them dropped,” Amnesty explained.
However, the trials of suspects have not begun, and about 40 percent of victims who lost property have yet to obtain government compensation, Amnesty elaborated.
“Despite the authorities’ assurances of accountability, the grossly inadequate action has allowed a climate of impunity for the perpetrators of the Jaranwala violence,” Babu Ram Pant, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director for South Asia, proclaimed.
In January this year, a Pakistani court also sentenced four people to death because they allegedly posted sacrilegious material on social media about Islamic religious figures and the Quran.
Anti-blasphemy measures that were put into place in Muslim-majority Pakistan in the 1980s criminalized any attempts to insult Islam. Since then, people have been prosecuted for allegedly insulting the religion, desecrating its texts, or writing offensive remarks on the walls of mosques. Nevertheless, critics of these anti-blasphemy laws have pointed out how people have abused them to settle personal vendettas.
