ISLAMABAD, June 20: Former tourism minister Senator Nilofar Bakhtiar has served a legal notice on the head of the ‘Sharia court’ established by Lala Masjid administration, seeking an apology from him for damaging her reputation and political career by issuing a fatwa against her.

In the notice served on Mufti Mohammad Yunus through Advocates Dr M. Aslam Khaki and Syed Liaquat Banori she said she would initiate civil as well as criminal proceedings against him and ‘the culprits behind him’, if an apology was not tendered within one week.

The ‘court’ established in the mosque had issued its first decree against Ms Bakhtiar for hugging a Frenchman after paragliding in Paris, saying that Islam did not allow such actions.

The counsel for Ms Bakhtiar contended that her conduct was in good faith and like between a father and daughter. In European countries, and even in the remote areas of Pakistan, hugging by elders was for greeting and regard and it did not bear germs of immorality as conceived by the cleric. “It is you and your evil thinking which has created, converted and portrayed the innocent act as something immoral and un-Islamic.”

They challenged the authority of the ‘so-called Sharia court’ to issue a decree “despite the fact that you have neither requisite qualification of a mufti or a Sharia court nor have any authority to issue a decree, it is surprising that you did not give Nilofar Bakhtiar an opportunity to explain her disputed conduct. This conduct on your part proves a mala fide behind the decree.”