PESHAWAR, Nov 29: A local newsman convicted under the blasphemy law has been awaiting the fixation of his appeal by the Peshawar High Court for the last more than six months.The newsman, Munawar Mohsin Ali, was convicted by an additional district and sessions judge on May 8 and was sentenced to life with a fine of Rs50,000.

The court had held Munawar, a sub-editor in daily The Frontier Post, responsible for publication of a blasphemous letter in the daily in its issue of Jan 29, 2001. Since the publication of the letter, Mr Munawar has been in etention.
It is learnt that despite various appeals from human rights bodies and journalists organisations, the high court has yet not fixed his appeal for hearing.Mr Munawar told Dawn that it was known to everyone that the publication of the letter was not an intentional act. He added that being a true Muslim he could never even think of committing such an heinous act.

Although Mr Munawar is an educated person, he has been spending his time with hardened criminals inside the prison.
His appeal was filed soon after his conviction by advocate Kamran Arif, a human rights activist, saying that the trial court had overlooked various important points while convicting the appellant.

Different human rights and journalists organisations from across the world, including the Amnesty International, the Pakistan Federal Union of Journalists, the Reporters Sans Frontiers (RSF), the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), have expressed concern over his conviction and requested the President of Pakistan and the Chief Justice of the Peshawar High Court to pay immediate attention to his case as the publication of the letter was not a deliberate act of the newsman.

Moreover, the convicted newsman was suffering from mental ailment and was in bad health, which was one of the major reasons for the publication of the letter. The human rights bodies have also condemned the attitude of bar associations as the Peshawar Bar Association had passed a resolution after the occurrence, asking its members not to represent the main accused in the case before the trial court.

The case was registered by information department director Mehdi Hussain at West Cantt police station under section 295 (A), (B) and (C) and 505 of the Pakistan Penal Code. The blasphemous letter was purportedly written by a person named Ben DZec and appeared in the ‘Your Views’ column of the newspaper. In the letter, derogatory remarks were used against the Holy Prophet Muhammad (Peace Be Upon Him).

The very next day a violent mob set on fire the printing press of the newspaper and damaged other public properties, including a cinema house. The publication of The Frontier Post remained suspended for few months after the publication of the letter.Soon after the occurrence, the NWFP government had ordered a judicial inquiry which was conducted by Justice Qaim Jan Khan of the high court.

In the inquiry, the tribunal had examined the concerned doctor, Mohammad Tariq, of the mental hospital who informed the tribunal that Mr Munawar had escaped from the hospital and they had informed the management of the newspaper about that. The tribunal had observed that the mental condition of Mr Munawar Mohsin was not sound and he was an addict and mentally sick person was ordered to sit on an important desk/page like the editorial page, which included ‘Yours Views’ section.

The appellant has stated that the trial judge had committed grave illegality by not following mandatory provision of section 465 of the Criminal Procedure Code even when it was established during the prosecution evidence that the appellant had a history of mental illness and had received treatment for the same.
Source: Dawn
Date:11/30/2003