MANSEHRA: The district and sessions judge of Kohistan, Sardar Mohammad Irshad, has directed police to produce before the court the male members of the family of the five women, who were seen clapping in a controversial video surfaced in 2012.

The court fixed May 7 for next hearing. The lawyers of Human Rights Commission and officials were told that family members of the women seen in the video had moved Abbottabad Circuit Bench of Peshawar High Court to get a stay order against appearance of the women in the court.

The high court has fixed April 28 to hear the plea. The family members of the women petitioned the high court to exempt the women from appearing in the court.

They argued that women couldn’t appear in the court according to local culture and traditions.

“As the high court is going to hear the writ petition of the relatives of the women in question on April 28 so the case is adjourned till May 7,” the court ordered.

The family members of the women in question again did not appear in the court.

During the last hearing, police had told the court that the women or their family members could not be produced because of the blockade of Karakorum Highway.

Mohammad Afzal, who first broke the news about the alleged killing of the five women seen the video, was also present in the court.

Mr Afzal, whose two brothers seen in the video were gunned down last year, was asked by the court to hire a lawyer to pursue his case.

The lawyer of Human Rights Commission, Mazhar Akram Awan, told the court that his client wanted to stop killing of women in such fashion. He said that his client wanted that the case should be decided in the district where it occurred.

Three people, including the two brothers seen in the controversial video, had been gunned down allegedly by the family members of the women.

A high level facts finding commission constituted by the then chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry after taking suo motu notice of the alleged killing of the five women, seen clapping in the video, had ostensibly met with the women on June 16, 2013 and the case was disposed of.