LONDON: A UK High Court hearing a defamation claim brought by Pakistani Canadian pop star Meesha Shafi against private channel New Vision TV, the broadcaster of ARY UK, has found that the channel had defamed the celebrity in a December 2020 broadcast.

At a preliminary hearing, the court found that the channel had made defamatory statements by asserting in its broadcast that Ms Shafi was deliberately failing to comply with court orders over the course of two years and that the channel depicted Ms Shafi as “someone who does not comply with legal requirements laid down by a court and engages in such behaviour repeatedly”.

“Such an assertion would have the tendency of lowering the claimant [Ms Shafi] in the estimation of right-thinking people generally; it is contrary to the common shared values of our society for people to deliberately ignore court orders requiring them to attend court, and to do so repeatedly over an extended period…The claimant is a very high-profile Pakistani celebrity who has taken a leading role in the advancement of women’s rights, holding herself out as an example to society. Given the claimant’s standing, the words complained of are likely to have a seriously adverse impact on the way the claimant is treated, thus satisfying the seriousness threshold.”

The channel now has to submit its defence to the court by January 26, 2024.

The broadcast in question was aired by ARY UK on December 5, 2020 in which reports presented by newsreaders and on tickers were submitted as evidence.

The court examined the evidence in the broadcast, which said: “She [Ms Shafi] came to Pakistan, did her work and left. Singer Meesha Shafi threw the court orders to the winds. She came to Pakistan, recorded a song and then returned to Canada. She did not present herself in court. Ali Zafar has filed a defamation lawsuit against Meesha.”

In 2018, Ms Shafi accused singer and actor Ali Zafar of physical sexual harassment, in what was thought to be the first #MeToo moment in Pakistan.

Mr Zafar, who has recently been crowned ‘Pakistani Singer of the Year’ at the prestigious Distinctive Intern­ational Arab Festival Awa­rds, filed a defamation case against Ms Shafi.

She filed a case of sexual harassment in the LHC against Mr Zafar, but the claim was rejected on technical grounds that her allegations did not fall under the workplace harassment law.

In 2021, the Supreme Court agreed to hear her case to determine whether her allegations against Mr Zafar fall under the country’s Protection Against Harassment of Women at the Workplace Act of 2010.

Published in Dawn, December 18th, 2023