ISLAMABAD
The Supreme Court of Pakistan has ruled that a woman’s right to seek khula (judicial dissolution of marriage) is constitutional, and that subjecting her to violence for exercising this right constitutes an assault on the Constitution itself.
A three-member bench dismissed the jail petition of convict Waseem Abbas and upheld his death sentence.
The detailed four-page judgment, authored by Justice Muhammad Hashim Khan Kakar, was released on Saturday.
The ruling stated that the law will deal strictly with those who commit violence against women seeking khula. It emphasized that Articles 9, 14, and 25 of the Constitution guarantee protection and equal rights for women.
“Killing a woman for demanding her legal right is open rebellion against the law and an act of brutality,” the judgment read.
“Such a cold-blooded and premeditated murder convict deserves no leniency.”
According to the verdict, testimonies of relatives in crimes committed within domestic boundaries cannot be dismissed. The forensic match of the spent bullet casings and the pistol recovered from the scene constitutes irrefutable evidence of the crime. The court found no defects in the lower courts’ decisions and upheld the death penalty.
It may be recalled that Waseem fatally shot his former wife, on October 11, 2020. The woman had obtained a legal decree of khula from a family court just 48 hours prior to her murder. Motivated by resentment over the divorce, the accused entered her home and shot her six times.
The trial court had sentenced the accused to death along with 10 years of imprisonment. The Lahore High Court had also previously upheld the death sentence.
