PESHAWAR: Peshawar High Court has granted bail to a person arrested on charges of killing his transgender brother on pretext of honour in Buner district around two months ago.

A single-member bench of Justice Shahid Khan accepted bail petition of the accused, Abdur Rehman, a resident of Peshawar, on condition of furnishing two surety bonds of Rs200,000 each.

The FIR of the occurrence was registered at Swari City police station in Buner on May 8, 2024, under section 302 (intentional murder) and 311 (fasad fil arz or mischief on earth) of Pakistan Penal Code and section 15 of Arms Act.

The complainant in the FIR was Sultan Said, the father of the deceased Noor Rehman alias Babli.

Noor Rehman alias Babli was shot dead in Buner two months ago

During course of hearing, the complainant also submitted an affidavit to the court stating that he had no objection if the accused was released on bail. The complainant stated in the FIR that his deceased son was fond of dancing and for the last two to three years he had been living like a transgender.

He said that the deceased had been living for the last around one year at a plaza in Swari city along with other transgender persons. The complainant claimed that his other son Abdur Rehman was annoyed over the way of living of his brother.

He stated that through sources he came to know that Abdur Rehman along with his friends Khyber and Salman Khan visited Buner and fired at his brother, resulting in his death. He added that several transgender persons witnessed the occurrence.

“The record so furnished would reflect that the event in hand is prima facie unseen in its nature and kind. Similarly, the complainant has neither disclosed the name of those persons, who have informed him about the alleged involvement of the petitioner in the commission of offence nor he could put forward any other cogent and worth reliable information in this regard, which could prima facie speaks about the guilt or otherwise of the accused,” the bench observed while accepting the bail petition.

Furthermore, the bench observed that in the FIR, the complainant had not disclosed the name of any transgender person in whose presence his deceased son was allegedly killed.

Advocate Mohammad Israr appeared for the petitioner and contended that his client was falsely implicated in the instant case. He added that no recovery had been made from the petitioner by police despite remaining in their custody for many days.

Earlier, Buner Sessions Judge Sumera Wali had rejected the bail plea of the accused on May 23, 2024. The judge had observed that the accused was directly charged in the FIR for the commission of brutal murder of the deceased in the name of honour due to adopting transgender way of life.

The judge had observed that though compromise had been submitted by complainant, yet the offence under section 311 PPC, under which the accused was charged, was not compoundable in nature.

The sessions judge had also referred to section 16 of Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2018, stating that transgender persons had equal rights as of other citizens in Pakistan.

The court had also referred to CCTV footage, observing that the footage prima facie connected the accused with the commission of the offence.

Published in Dawn, July 8th, 2024