ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday stopped the police from registering cases under sections of the blasphemy law against the top leadership of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party.
On May 1, Faisalabad police booked party’s chairman Imran Khan, senior vice president Fawad Chaudhry and Awami Muslim League (AML) president Sheikh Rasheed Ahmad, among 150 people, on blasphemy charges over sloganeering against Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and his delegation in Medina.
The first information report (FIR), lodged after midnight in Medina Town police station in Faisalabad, the home town of Minister for Interior Rana Sanaullah Khan, nominated some “100 to 150” for purportedly violating the sanctity of Masjid al-Nabawi, hurting the sentiments of Muslims around the globe, insulting Islamic and violating its code of conduct at one of the holiest places in the religion, and hurling abuses and chanting slogans of thieves and traitors.
Following the filing of the complaint, Sanaullah vowed to arrest Khan in the case.
Calling the former prime minister a fitna (mischief), Sanaullah, in a statement, said those who “planned” the sloganeering “will be taken to task”. “Imran Khan will definitely be arrested,” he added.
Today, Chief Justice Athar Minallah said it was the responsibility of the political leadership of a country to create harmony in society.
“Religious sentiments are important but the state has some responsibility. We have seen in the past that religion was employed to target political opponents […] but it was the Constitution which united people,” CJ remarked.
Justice Minallah said that he read the police cases and they should not have been registered in the first place and in general the cases registered in Pakistan are not correct.
The judge said using religion for politics is tantamount to contempt of oneself and a violation of human rights.
He said that things will go wrong if society will not have tolerance and forgiveness. “What happened in Medina city was not the right thing to do but it occurred there [and not in Pakistan].”
The judge said that there should be some rules of policies and that religion must not be used for politics.
Chaudhry appeared before the IHC and said that he was surprised at the lodging of such cases against members of his party.
He said: “We have full commitment. We will not use religious cards against each other. The government should also not use the religious cards.”
Chaudhry added that he witnessed martial laws and other discriminations in the past but never a contempt of religion case was registered.
He said he was a friend of the incumbent Minister for Law and Justice but he was surprised by his statements. He added: “This trend that has started will pose dangerous consequences.”
Last week, Chaudhry moved IHC against the lodging of the cases. The interior secretary, Sanaullah, the director general of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) as well as the police chiefs of Islamabad, Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan were made respondents in the petition.
The case hearing has been adjourned for two weeks and summoned by the attorney general in the next hearing.
