KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) on Monday dismissed the bail application of a security guard in a child marriage case.

The applicant, Azhar Ali, through his lawyer moved the SHC after a sessions court had dismissed his post-arrest bail application.

The suspect has been facing trial for abducting his neighbour’s underage girl in January 2025 in Block-5 of Gulshan-i-Iqbal. A case was lodged against him under Section 365-B of Pakistan Penal Code read with Section 3 of the Prevention of Trafficking in Persons Act, 2018.

The lawyer for the applicant argued that his client had been framed since the abductee herself recorded statements under Section 161 & 164 CrPC before the investigating officer.

The judicial magistrate concerned respectively and categorically denied abduction, and testified that she had left her home of her own volition and solemnised a free-will marriage with the applicant at their Naushahro Feroze house, he added.

However, a deputy prosecutor general opposed the bail plea on the grounds that the abductee was a minor, aged between 15 to 16 years, as determined through

the ossification test, and the same was corroborated by multiple educational records and a birth certificate.

A single-judge bench headed by Justice Khalid Hussain Shahani in his order noted that the plea of free-will marriage raised by the lawyer for the applicant was of no avail at that stage since as per medical tests, she was underage.

Published in Dawn, April 22nd, 2025