Blasphemy case probe finds Pak cleric guilty
24 Sep 2012 11:01 PM GMT
Investigations into the blasphemy case involving a minor Christian girl in Pakistan have found cleric Khalid Jadoon guilty while exonerating the teenaged girl, Dawn newspaper reported.
Rimsah Masih, the minor Christian girl, faced a life sentence for allegedly burning the Holy Quran’s pages. But she was later released on bail.
Jadoon has been taken into judicial custody as he is ‘accused of inserting pages of the Quran into the bag containing other religious material that the girl is alleged to have burned.’
Investigating Officer Munir Hussain Jaffery in his challan states that it was Jadoon who ripped two pages from the Holy Quran and mixed them in the half burnt pages of the book.
It said Jadoon was the real blasphemer since he was a Muslim, an educated person, religious scholar and the cleric of a mosque and fully aware of the Quran’s sanctity.
Masih was mentally weak and uneducated and was not able to distinguish between the papers of the holy book or ordinary literature, it added.
The invesitgating officer, however, has irked the district attorney Islamabad, Mehfooz Paracha, who has written a dissenting note on the challan and expressed reservations over the official.
Parcha disagreed with the police challan and said that Jaffery wrongly declared him the prime accused.
Speaking to a US broadcaster a few days ago, Masih had expressed her fear of getting killed. Her lawyers denied that she desecrated the Quran. They said instead that the neighbour wanted to settle a personal score with the girl because the two didn’t get along.
The lawyers told CNN that this may have been because he liked her but she didn’t like him back. Â
Rimsah Masih, the minor Christian girl, faced a life sentence for allegedly burning the Holy Quran’s pages. But she was later released on bail.
Jadoon has been taken into judicial custody as he is ‘accused of inserting pages of the Quran into the bag containing other religious material that the girl is alleged to have burned.’
Investigating Officer Munir Hussain Jaffery in his challan states that it was Jadoon who ripped two pages from the Holy Quran and mixed them in the half burnt pages of the book.
It said Jadoon was the real blasphemer since he was a Muslim, an educated person, religious scholar and the cleric of a mosque and fully aware of the Quran’s sanctity.
Masih was mentally weak and uneducated and was not able to distinguish between the papers of the holy book or ordinary literature, it added.
The invesitgating officer, however, has irked the district attorney Islamabad, Mehfooz Paracha, who has written a dissenting note on the challan and expressed reservations over the official.
Parcha disagreed with the police challan and said that Jaffery wrongly declared him the prime accused.
Speaking to a US broadcaster a few days ago, Masih had expressed her fear of getting killed. Her lawyers denied that she desecrated the Quran. They said instead that the neighbour wanted to settle a personal score with the girl because the two didn’t get along.
The lawyers told CNN that this may have been because he liked her but she didn’t like him back. Â
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