September 23, 2002	Monday	Rajab 15, 1423

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ISLAMABAD, Sept 22: The fate of Rubina Ansari, the 25-year-old woman who is on death row, will be known some times next week, when the president is expected to give his decision on her mercy petition, Dawn learnt from an official source.

Rubina Ansari of Sargodha, awaits the decision, which could mean death or life for her. She was convicted of murdering a woman in 1998.

Ms Ansari has exhausted all her legal options, including an appeal before the supreme court. The death sentence has been upheld, as conclusive evidence has come on record that she tricked a 70-year-woman, Hajjan Aziz Begum, and brought her to her house to rob her of gold ornaments.

The relatives of Aziz Begum are not ready to pardon Ms Ansari, under the Qisas and Diyat law.

On learning that the file has reached the president, the aggrieved party has moved an application, saying that a wrong impression was being given that they had agreed to pardon the convict.

The president has been approached by the local and international human right groups, demanding the condonation of her sentence under his constitutional powers to pardon a convict.

There is a strong legal controversy raging over whether the president’s power to pardon a convicted person was still intact after the introduction of Qisas law, as it had changed the nature of the offence.

Under the English law, which was in force before the promulgation of Qisas and Diyat law in 1990, murder was an offence against the state.

But after the introduction of Qisas and Diyat law, it has become an offence between individuals, and the legal heirs of the deceased are empowered to pardon the convict.

However, there is a view that the president’s Constitutional power to pardon a convict, which might be contrary to the Islamic injunctions, was intact until it was suitably amended by the parliament.

The mercy petition was sent to the president on Friday and he is expected to decide on it in the coming week, an official told Dawn.

Human rights groups argue that there was no witness to the crime and the conviction was based on circumstantial evidence.

But the case has been believed by the trial court, high court, and supreme court.

If Ms Ansari’s sentence was not altered, she would be the first woman in 16 years to be sent to the gallows.

The former Pakistan Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto, is among those who have asked the president to prevent the execution of a woman, because in doing so, Pakistan’s image would be enhanced.

Some human rights groups are demanding the commutation of the death sentence to life imprisonment, but others are trying for an outright release to allow her to be with her seven-year-old daughter.

Ms Ansari’s husband divorced her after the registration of a murder case against her.