Daily Times

PESHAWAR: The lynching of Mashal Khan on April 13 inside Abdul Wali Khan University Mardan (AWKUM) in a fabricated case of blasphemy on social media shook the whole country. The inhuman incident not only triggered long debates about whether mobsters have been given a free hand in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan to issue verdicts and serve punishments on their own in such delicate matters.

Although many prominent figures from all walks of life, including renowned religious scholar Mufti Muhammad Naeem, head of Jamia Binoria Karachi strongly condemned the killing and called the late student a martyr, many blood-thirsty names justified the brutality by backing the unfound allegations.

According to eyewitnesses from the day of the incident, nearly 3,000 mobsters consisting of students and university employees were involved in the violence that first saw Abdulla being badly beaten in the administration building before Mashal Khan shot four times and before he was inhumanly kicked, beaten with wood planks, steel rods, dragged in his hostel’s corridors, dropped from the second floor, stoned and undressed posthumously.

Questions were raised about the alleged silence of policemen standing near the haunted Hostel 1. Sources in the AWKUM allege that police were informed well in time about the unrest and there was an increased number of policemen present on the campus along with armored vehicles. However, the huge number of angry mobsters was cited as the sole reason for the failure of police to protect Mashal when he was under attack.

Nevertheless, strong activism by human rights activists, intense media coverage and social media played a vital role in forcing not only the Mardan Police but also the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) led provincial government to seriously investigate the matter that started to reveal names and motives other than blasphemy only hours after the death of a brilliant student who had raised his voice against the alleged corruption by a number of office bearers affiliated to a nationalist political party from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Up to 59 persons were named directly or indirectly involved in the lynching incident. The Mardan police were able to lock up at least 12 accused persons within the first 24 hours. These included at least five university employees. One of the named university employees was identified as Ajmal Mayar. Ajmal is the president of the AWKUM employees union and he is said to be a relation to Himayatullah Mayar, District Nazim Mardan and President of Awami National Party’s Mardan chapter.

With the passage of time and emergence of more videos of lynching, angry speeches by student political bodes and social media snapshot, police were able to arrest more accused persons as the number rose to 33 within a week.

Mashal’s innocence gained more weightage when statements by his friend Abdullah, who was also accused of committing blasphemy, Abdullah in his statement to the judicial magistrate claimed that he was pressurized by the university students to admit that Mashal Khan had committed blasphemy.

Similarly, Wajahat, a suspect arrested in the lynching case confessed in his written statement that he was asked by the university administration to testify against Mashal Khan only hours before the incident took place.

Another statement, an on air by Ziaullah Hamdard, lecturer at the Journalism and Mass Communication Department, AWKUM turned the tide against the University administration which has dared to issue a fake statement regarding expulsion of Mashal Khan, Abdullah and Zubair for their alleged blasphemy. Ziaullah claimed that the statement was issued after the incident as he braved the stress and agony of losing a ‘brilliant’ student.

In a recent development, Bilal Bakhsh, security in charge at AWKUM was arrested by Mardan police after remaining underground for a week. Bilal Bakhsh has been accused of saying that he will kill Mashal Khan with his own hands and that anyone taking side of Mashal and his comrades will be dealt with iron hands. Meanwhile a student named Amir was arrested from Tangi, Charsadda after he was identified in a video footage of the lynching.

Political leaders, including Imran Khan and ANP central president Asfandyar Wali Khan had issued strong statements against the unjustified murder of Mashal Khan. The ANP was unable to bring out any statement of condemnation from its Mardan district Nazim. It took the party 10 days to issue a show cause notice to Himayatullah Mayar, asking him to clarify his position within three days on why his statements and actions were against a clear stance of the party.

It merits mentioning that a statement attributed to Himayatullah Mayar went viral from his social media account had urged the ANP and Pakhtun Students Federation (PSF) workers to stay away from the incident and restrain from issuing any statement in the Mashal Khan incident.

A day after the incident, some local media sources had carried a news report about a secret indoor meeting of representatives of different political parties including ANP, PTI, Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazal (JUI-F) and Khatm-e-Nabuwat Mutahida Dini Mahaz in which they decided that Mashal Khan’s Facebook account suggested that he was involved in blasphemy.

Whether the provincial government and KP police would be able to bring all the responsible persons to the court of law is too early to predict. However, the government has to perform, above all pressures from political and religious parties to provide justice to Mashal Khan and all save many more Mashal’s from being wrongfully killed in the name of the religion.