Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry on Wednesday held the first hearing of suo motu notice on the recent case of 13 girls declared “vani” by a jirga in Balochistan’s Dera Bugti area, ordering the authorities to produce the affected girls. A three-member bench of the Supreme Court, including Justice Khilji Arif Hussain and Justice Jawwad S Khawaja, heard the case.
According to reports, a jirga in Dera Bugti decided to give away 13 girls in marriage to settle a murder-related conflict between two tribes last month. After the case was reported in the media, the CJP took a suo motu notice. He had issued orders to Balochistan MPA Mir Tariq Masuri, who allegedly chaired the jirga, and all members of the tribal jirga to appear before the jury at the Supreme Court’s Quetta registry on Wednesday. Masuri turned up and denied that the incident had taken place. He said he was in Multan and had returned after hearing the news on media about the court’s suo motu notice. “It is just propaganda to hurt my uncle’s political credibility in the area,” the MPA claimed.