Daily Times

Rejecting the reports about Ali Zafar serving a legal notice to Meesha Shafi over her allegations of sexual harassment, Meesha’s lawyer Barrister Ali Pansota said his client has received no notice. “A legal notice from him in this case will hold little value anyway, because it is not that Meesha has issued any inappropriate statements against Zafar,” Pansota told Daily Times, adding that Meesha stands by her statement.

He also said that Meesha has proofs to back her allegations, adding that they will not wait for Zafar to serve a notice before taking action. “There are several institutions in the country including Woman Ombudsperson office where Meesha can take her accusations. We will form our legal strategy and take the case to the relevant institution in a week,” he told Daily Times.

Nighat Dad, who has also been appointed by Meesha as her counsel, is of the opinion that the kind of support that Meesha is receiving over the issue is from women who have experienced the same but did not have the courage to open up. She said that the justice system of the country is deeply flawed and the culture of victim-shaming in such cases is rampant, which is why Meesha chose to make her experience public on social media first. “Most of those who ask why Meesha didn’t go to the courts first agree that the aggrieved do not get relief from the justice system of the country because of the many loopholes it has.”

However, she added that Meesha’s case is strong and the team would make all-out efforts to ensure that ‘justice is served’. “We will try our best to ensure that a precedent is set in the case because the entire world is currently seeking an end to sexual harassment and it is about time Pakistan also adopted a zero-tolerance policy against the menace,” she said.

Published in Daily Times, April 25^th 2018.