Tariq Saeed
Peshawar
The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Thursday converted the death sentence of the man convicted for the 2017 lynching of university student Mashal Khan, into life imprisonment.
The Peshawar High Court’s verdict, initially reserved on September 30, was pronounced by Justice Lal Jan Khattak and Justice Syed Atiq Shah.
The PHC, however, declared the release of 25 accused in the case void and ordered their arrest. It upheld a previous verdict sentencing them to at least three years in prison. Additionally, it upheld the life imprisonment sentences handed down to seven others.
Mashal Khan, 23, a student of the Department of Mass Communication at Mardan’s Abdul Wali Khan University, it may be recalled, was brutally lynched by a mob over an allegation of blasphemy on April 13, 2017.
A 13-member joint investigation team (JIT) was formed to probe the case. The JIT revealed in its report in June 2017 that members of the Pakhtoon Students Federation, the student wing of the Awami National Party, incited the mob to kill Mashal on the pretext of blasphemy.
In 2018, an anti-terrorism court (ATC) had convicted 31 of the 57 accused in the case, and sentenced to death Imran Khan, the prime accused. Seven others were sentenced to life imprisonment and 25 others to three years in jail. Later that same year, a division bench of the PHC, including Justice Khattak and Justice Shah, approved a bail plea filed by the 25 accused. The convict Imran had filed an appeal with the court asking it to reduce the sentence.
