A dangerous change

Back in the spotlight are the country’s controversial blasphemy laws. The reason: the Supreme Court’s Shariat Appellate Bench dismissed an appeal against a 1990 Federal Shariat Court judgment which decreed that under Article 295-C of the Pakistan Penal Code blasphemy against Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) should be punished with death, and not the alternative of life imprisonment.

Because of non-prosecution by the appellant the Supreme Court did not go into the merits of the appeal, but the result is that the FSC judgment is now operative: the death penalty is now mandatory under Article 295-C. Having opposed the penalty — although there is no doubt that the commission of blasphemy is deserving of the most stringent punishment — we regard Tuesday’s decision as regrettable.

Unfortunately, when it comes to the blasphemy laws there is a tendency to debate the issue from a religious perspective — but that is not the main issue here. From a purely technical perspective, the blasphemy laws contain too many loopholes to be considered soundly drafted in legal terms. Consider Article 295-C, which states: ‘Whoever by word, either spoken or written, or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him) shall be punished with death …’ The wording is vague and over-inclusive. Conceivably, someone belonging to another religion asking about the details of Islam or expressing his own religion’s position could be booked. Surely that is not something that should fall in the category of ‘blasphemy’.

The point is that vague laws always create opportunities for abuse and that the dangers increase manifold when vagueness is linked to something as extreme as the death penalty and as inflammatory as blasphemy. Pakistan’s experience with the blasphemy laws suggests they are potent tools of oppression that have been used to victimise the innocent. Score-settling, petty property disputes, personal revenge — all have been linked to blasphemy cases registered over the years. Upping the ante by making the death penalty mandatory in certain cases will only increase the already horrifying leverage that the unscrupulous have over those they wish to target.

We have opposed the death penalty because given Pakistan’s broken judicial system there is always the likelihood of a grave miscarriage of justice. In the case of blasphemy, the possibility of a fair trial is anyway tremendously reduced — meaning now far more of the innocent may face the prospect of the ultimate penalty.