By Nasir Aijaz
The AsiaN Representative
ISLAMABAD: A local court in Rawalpindi, twin city of the country’s capital Islamabad, convicted five men for committing blasphemy on social media and handed them death sentences on March 25, 2025.
The court ordered that the convicts “be hanged” by neck until death.
Additional District and Sessions Judge of Rawalpindi, Muhammad Tariq Ayub convicted Muhammad Arsalan Azam, Zunair Sikander, Khurram Afzal, Ali Abbas, and Faisal Rehan, an Afghan national in multiple blasphemy charges and handed them down death sentences besides different jail terms and fines.
The judge ruled that the convicts had committed a heinous crime and that they did not deserve any concession.
According to the verdict, each convict got death sentence for blasphemy of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) under section 295-C of Pakistan Penal Code (PPC), 10 year jail term and a heavy fine for outraging religious feelings of the Muslims under section 295-A of PPC, rigorous imprisonment for life for defiling the Holy Quran under section 295-B of PPC, and seven years rigorous imprisonment for hate speech under section 11 of Pakistan’s Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA) 2016.
The case against the five convicts was registered by Cyber Wing of Federal Investigation Agency FIA on September 15, 2023. A private citizen complained to the FIA that he visited and saw multiple posts and videos on the social media accounts of the accused bringing the religious figures and the book into disrepute and further sharing the sacrilegious material.
Advocate Raja Imrn Khalil, who represented the complainant in the case, told the media that the sacrilegious posts were very disturbing and could not be described here. The lawyer said that the trial took one year and five months to be completed.
The FIA forensic reports confirmed the social media IDs used to disseminate the sacrilegious material were of the convicts. The IDs were positively configured with the mobile phones of the accused.
The verdict was announced amid tight security, with a large number of lawyers and citizens present in the courtroom. Following the decision, all five convicts were escorted under heavy security to the jail.
Separately, police in Lahore city of Punjab province said on Tuesday that a YouTube star, Rajab Butt, was charged with blasphemy for naming his perfume brand after the law section of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) that is related to blasphemy, AFP reported.
In a recent promotional video, since deleted from his social media accounts, Butt launched his perfume, whose name referred to the blasphemy legislation in the penal code. The perfume publicity sparked ire, prompting the leader of the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), a religious extremist organization, to file a complaint late on Monday.
“Our religious sentiments have been hurt,” TLP leader Haider Ali Shah Gillani said. “There are numerous sections in the penal code but why did he choose blasphemy-related sections to name a perfume? This means you acknowledge the offence and are celebrating it,” he added.
Butt issued an apology video on Sunday, asserting that he was not against the blasphemy laws. “I apologize for the words I uttered during the launch of the perfume,” he said. “I apologize and announce the discontinuation of this perfume,” he added.
