Death Penalty News

A bench of Justices Ashwani Kumar Mishra and Rohit Kapoor allowed the appeal filed by the two convicts and commuted their death sentence to life imprisonment. The Punjab and Haryana High Court has commuted to life imprisonment the death penalty of two men convicted for kidnapping and murdering a minor boy for ransom in 2005 on the grounds of their illegal solitary confinement and the state’s delay in deciding mercy petitions. A bench of Justices Ashwani Kumar Mishra and Rohit Kapoor allowed the appeal filed by the two convicts and commuted their death sentence to life imprisonment for the remainder of their natural lives without any commutation or premature release.

The Lahore police have arrested Jamila Jacob, a Christian woman, on charges of committing blasphemy against the Prophet Muhammad. The arrest followed an FIR filed at the North Cantonment police station, Lahore by Asif Ali, a local shopkeeper.

Neelam sentenced to death for burying toddler alive after kidnapping her, in a rare and heinous crime. The court found her guilty of murder and destruction of evidence, causing outrage in society. LUDHIANA: Over two years after the brutal murder of a toddler, the woman who killed her was sentenced to death by a local court. The convict had buried her neighbour’s two-and-a-half-year-old daughter alive. 

A court in Pakistan has sentenced a 22-year-old student to death on charges of blasphemy over Whatsapp messages. The court in Punjab Province said he had shared blasphemous pictures and videos with the intention to outrage the religious feelings of Muslims. A 17-year-old was sentenced to life imprisonment as part of the same case. Both have denied wrongdoing.

Two Christian brothers facing blasphemy charges in Pakistan were cleared, following allegations that had prompted many Muslims to riot in their neighborhood last August Two Christian brothers who were facing blasphemy charges in Muslim-majority Pakistan have been cleared of all allegations and set free, their lawyer reported March 1. The accusations against them had previously led to violent riots, with hundreds of Muslims devastating the neighborhood where they lived last August.

Balwinder Singh (38), who reached his native Mallan village today after paying Rs 2 crore blood money in Saudi Arabia, said three more Indians hailing from Uttar Pradesh and Kerala had been handed out death penalties. Balwinder said the trio had asked him to speak to the senior officials in India.  He said a resident of Kerala had been lodged in a jail in Riyadh for the past 17 years.  Out of five UP’s residents, two were facing death penalty and three had been sentenced to imprisonment of up to 10 to 20 years, he said.

Decades ago, converts thought the country would be a refuge from the caste system. Today, they risk criminal charges and remain largely relegated to sanitation jobs. Two Christian Pakistani teenagers, one 18 and another 14, were arrested in their homes in Lahore in May 2023 on charges of blasphemy after a policeman claimed he heard them being disrespectful of the Prophet Muhammad. Among Muslim-majority countries, Pakistan has the strictest blasphemy laws. People jailed under these laws risk a sentence of life in prison and worse still, even death. Christians and other religious minorities make up a mere 4 percent of Pakistan’s population, but they account for about half of blasphemy charges.

As he tried to restart his stalled car, the young military doctor would have heard the speech being delivered to the Muslim Railway Employees Association near Quetta railway station. Followers of the Ahmadi faith, a frenzied cleric was proclaiming, were blasphemers and heretics, who ought to be punished by death. Then, someone in the crowd noticed that Major Mahmood Ahmad had a short beard. The doctor’s body was found later, his one lung cut through and his guts carved out of his body. Like so many thousands after it, the murder on 11 August 1948—Pakistan’s very first blasphemy killing—remained unidentified and the case was filed untraced. There was, judges Muhammad Munir and MR Kayani acidly recorded in an official inquiry, no one “willing to take credit for this act of Islamic heroism and out of a large number of persons who were eyewitnesses, none was able or willing to identify the ghazis who were authors of this brave deed.”

A Pakistani man from the minority Shia community has been sentenced to death by a court in Punjab province for defaming Islam, officials said on Wednesday. “Additional Sessions Judge (Faisalabad) Rana Sohail Tariq handed down the death sentence to suspect Wasim Abbas on the charges of insulting the Prophet. The court also imposed a fine of PKR 500,000 (over USD 2,820). In case of failure to pay the fine the convict will have to undergo two years imprisonment,” a court official told PTI. Abbas was arrested by the Factory Area police in Faisalabad, 180 km from provincial capital Lahore, in June 2020 after a complaint was lodged against him for allegedly insulting the Prophet and his companions. In the last few months, a Sri Lankan national and a mentally challenged man were brutally killed by a mob in Punjab province over allegations of blasphemy. Pakistan has extremely strict blasphemy laws against defaming Islam, including the death penalty, and rights campaigners say they are often us...

On December 3, 2021, a violent mob at the Wazirabad Road in Sialkot city (Sialkot District) of Punjab tortured a Sri Lankan national, Priyantha Kumara, to death over blasphemy allegations before burning his body. Kumara was accused of blasphemy for allegedly tearing down stickers of Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) from a wall of factory. Kumar was working as a senior manager at a leading Sialkot factory that manufactures and exports sports products, The last killing of a foreign national on blasphemy allegations was reported on July 29, 2020, when Tahir Naseem, a US citizen and an Ahmadi, was shot dead inside a District Court in Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, in the presence of security and the presiding judge. A video of the attacker, identified as Faisal Khan, in handcuffs, shouting angrily that his victim as an “enemy of Islam” was posted on various social media platforms. Faisal Khan was taken into custody on the spot. Meanwhile, in a press release on February 2, 2021, the Lahore-b...

Officials say police have arrested 13 suspects and detained dozens of others in the lynching of a Sri Lankan employee at a sports equipment factory in eastern Pakistan Police arrested 13 suspects and detained dozens of others in the lynching of a Sri Lankan employee at a sports equipment factory in eastern Pakistan, officials said Saturday. A mob of hundreds of enraged Muslims descended on the factory in the district of Sialkot in Punjab province Friday after the Sri Lankan manager of the factory was accused of blasphemy. The mob grabbed Priyantha Kumara, lynched him and publicly burned the body, according to police. Factory workers accused the victim of desecrating posters bearing the name of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad. Punjab police chief Rao Sardar said Saturday that investigators arrested prominent suspects after seeing their clear role on video in instigating workers to violence, killing the manager and dragging his body outside, and taking selfies with his burning body and proudly...

Pakistan police say a Muslim mob has attacked a sports equipment factory in the eastern Punjab province, killing a Sri Lankan and burning his body over allegations of blasphemy LAHORE, Pakistan -- A Muslim mob attacked a sports equipment factory in Pakistan's eastern Punjab province on Friday, killing a Sri Lankan man and burning his body publicly over allegations of blasphemy, police said. Armagan Gondal, a police chief in Sialkot district where the killing occurred said that factory workers had accused the victim of desecrating posters bearing the name of Islam's Prophet Muhammad. The Sri Lankan, Priyantha Diyawadana, was lynched by the mob inside the factory, Gondal said initial information showed. Videos circulating on social media showed a mob dragging the man's heavily bruised body out to the street, where they burned it in the presence of hundreds of demonstrators who cheered on the killers. However Gondal's district superior, Omar Saeed Malik, said police were s...

HAFIZABAD – A district and sessions court in Hafizabad, a city in Punjab province, sentenced a man to death while also slapping a penalty of Rs0.5 million after finding him guilty of raping his daughter. Reports in local media said a court on Wednesday sentenced a man to capital punishment for the heinous crime as the grandfather of the victim, who is also the father of the accused, had approached law enforcers against the culprit for raping the daughter in April this year. The accused, who is identified as Nasir Ali, denied the charges leveled against him by the prosecution and alleged his father for framing him in a bid to get his cattle. During the hearing, the prosecutor claimed that the victim informed her grandfather as she was subjected to sexual assault numerous times by his own father. Furthermore, the prosecutor informed the court that the medical reports have also proved sexual abuse on the girl. In the written verdict issued by Hafizabad court, it stated that the ‘culprit d...

LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — An anti-terrorism court in eastern Pakistan has issued a death sentence to a former security guard who last year shot and killed his bank's manager after accusing him of insulting Islam’s Prophet Mohammad, a lawyer said Thursday. Ahmad Nawaz has the right to appeal.  The ruling a day earlier in the district of Khusab in the eastern Punjab province also sentenced him to two years in prison for assaulting police during his arrest, according to prosecution lawyer Mian Rizwan. Nawaz was arrested in November 2020 after opening fire on his bank's manager, Malik Imran Hanif, in the Khushab district.  He briefly drew the attention of Islamists when he claimed he killed Hanif for insulting Islam's prophet. Hanif's family at the time denied the allegation.  Later, police concluded that Nawaz had a personal feud with the bank manager. Blasphemy is a controversial issue in Pakistan, where people convicted of the crime can be sentenced to life in prison or th...

Despite international condemnation over Pakistan's draconian blasphemy laws, which carry the death penalty, observers note that Christians continue to become common targets of discrimination of the laws, note observers. ANI -- Despite international condemnation over Pakistan's draconian blasphemy laws, which carry the death penalty, observers note that Christians continue to become common targets of discrimination of the laws, note observers. According to Pakistan Today, activists say that a persistent, apparently without reason, discrimination has turned into persecution against Christians, which is seen in cases where allegations are mostly baseless. "More than 90 per cent of the country's Christians reside in Punjab. And 60 per cent live in villages, and in most cases are more indigenous to their areas than Muslims. Blasphemy and desecration of the Quran are used against them, but the latter is used against them collectively, followed by organised destruction of pro...

Tightening its noose against those selling spurious liquor, the government has decided to add a provision death penalty in law for the culprits by amending the Punjab Excise Act, 1914. The Cabinet gave its approval to add Section 61 A and amendment of Section 61 and Section 63 and to introduce the Bill in this regard in the ongoing Budget session of the Vidhan Sabha. Section 61-A, which has been inserted in Punjab Excise Act, 1914 as its the Sub Section (1), stipulates that whoever mixes or permits to be mixed with any liquor sold or manufactured or possessed by him any noxious drug or any foreign ingredient likely to cause disability or grievous hurt or death to human beings, shall be punishable by death. In case of death, such guilty shall be punished with death or imprisonment for life and shall also be liable to fine which may extend to twenty lakh rupees. In case of disability or grievous hurt, the guilty would be punished with imprisonment for at least six years extendable up to ...