HYDERABAD, May 11: The Hyderabad circuit bench of the Sindh High Court has ordered to quash an FIR lodged against a married woman under the Zina and Hudood laws.

Rukhsana, wife of Karam Khan Nohani, had filed a petition before the court stating that she was a married woman and living a happy life with her husband.

She told the court on Tuesday, that her parents had died 10 years ago and she with her two sisters started living with a relative, Abdul Jabbar, in Kot Ghulam Mohammad. She alleged that her relative in the meantime sold her two sisters and she some how managed to escape a month ago to get married to Karam Khan Nohani on March 26, 2004.

The petitioner told the court that her relative with the abetment of police arrested her father-in-law, Mitho Khan, in a case under section 11/16 of the Zina Hudood Ordinance and was threatening her of being declared as Kari.

She pleaded before the court that she had married with her own freewill. Her counsel, Shahida Ansari, argued that as the petitioner had claimed that she had married of her own freewill then proceedings in the case were exercise in futility. When the court sought comments from Sindh Additional Advocate-General Masood A. Noorani against quashing the FIR, he raised no objections.