The Supreme Court on Monday took suo motu notice of the alleged killing of four women as a punishment for dancing at a wedding in Kohistan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry directed the attorney general of Pakistan to take details of the incident from the KP chief secretary and also asked for the four girls and two boys involved in the incident to be produced in court if they were alive.
The SC issued notices to the Hazara division commissioner, the Kohistan DPO and the Hazara DIG to appear in court on June 6.
Expressing displeasure with the jirga system, the SC said the people were punished by a jirga which was in violation of articles 9 and 14. The court said it had time and again stated that such jirgas were functioning illegally and unconstitutionally. A local jirga in Kohistan had ordered the killing of four women and two men accused of dancing together at a wedding. The interior minister said a judicial commission would conduct investigation into the incident. However, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Minister for Social Welfare Sattar Ayaz rejected the report, saying the accused women had not been killed.
Arrests: Meanwhile, police in Kohistan claimed to have arrested the two boys accused by the jirga. According to the boys’ brother, Afzal, the relatives handed them over to police to ensure their safety. During the initial investigations, the boys said they did not record the dance. Rather, the video consisted of two separate incidents.
