PESHAWAR, Oct 24: Seven of the eight posts of judges of the Federal Shariat Court are lying vacant hampering the functioning of the court. It has been learnt that many prisoners on death row, including juveniles and women, have been awaiting the outcome of their appeals for the last many years.
The Federal Shariat Court rules envisages that a Shariat petition could only be heard by a bench of three judges or more.
Similarly, appeals against verdicts of the sessions court in cases of capital punishment and amputation of limbs could only be heard by a bench consisting of not less than three judges. Under Article 203C, sub-clause 2 of the Constitution, the Shariat court shall consist of not more than eight Muslim judges, including the chief justice, to be appointed by the President of Pakistan.
Only the Shariat court is empowered to hear appeals originating out of the cases registered under the Hudood laws and the high court could not hear these cases.
Lawyers appearing before the Shariat court informed that presently Chief Justice Hazikul Khairi is the only judge in the Shariat court. He was appointed the Shariat court chief justice by the President in June.
Four of the judges namely Justice (retd) Zafar Iqbal Pasha Chaudhry, Justice (retd) Saeedur Rehman Farrukh, Justice (retd) S. A. Manan and Justice (retd) S. A. Rabbani got retired in June after completion of their three-year term. The term of another judge, Justice Dr Fida Mohammad Khan also expired recently.
Legal circles informed that two juvenile offenders hailing from Swat have been on death row since July 2002. The two boys, Mohammad Rafique and Sohail Fida, were charged with killing another boy Mohammad Zubair on May 25, 2000, in Swat.
As the Juvenile Justice System Ordinance, 2000, was not extended to the Provincially Administrated Tribal Areas by that time, the issue of their age was not raised during trial and a Qazi court sentenced them to death on July 23, 2002. Under the ordinance death penalty could not be awarded to juvenile offenders.
They filed an appeal before the PHC, which was transferred to the Shariat court in April 2003 as the two appellants were charged under the Offence Against Property (Enforcement of Hudood) Ordinance, 1979. Since then the two appellants have been awaiting the decision on their appeal.
In yet another case, a woman and a co-accused sentenced to death for killing her husband have been awaiting the outcome of their appeals for the last six years.
A minor daughter of the woman has also been in the Kohat prison with her for almost the last 10 years and there is no chance that her case would be disposed of in the near future.
The woman, Shehnaz, and the co-accused, Aamir Khan, who was the nephew of her husband, were arrested in connection with the killing of her husband Ibrar Ahmad in August 1996. A trial court convicted both of them in April 2002. Their appeals remained pending before the PHC but were later on transferred to the Shariat court as the two accused were also charged under the Offence of Zina Ordinance, 1979. On Jan 9, 2003, a full bench of the Shariat court in Peshawar took up for preliminary hearing their appeals and since then no noteworthy progress has taken place in their cases.
