Supreme Court orders government to respond to complaint.

Supreme Court orders government to respond to complaint.

Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Ayesha Malik gave the directions in response to a petition challenging the Lahore High Court’s (LHC) decision to send then 13-year-old Christian girl Nayab Gill to live with her Muslim “husband” two years ago.

Attorney Saif Ul Malook filed a petition with the Supreme Court in August 2021 against the LHC’s decision to send Nayab with 30-year-old Saddam Hayat, accused of kidnapping her and forcibly converting her to Islam, in the LHC’s rejection of her parents’ plea for custody.

“The petition was pending in the court for two years, during which the girl reunited with her family after escaping rom her abductor’s captivity,” Malook said. “The court noted that though Nayab had returned home, it wanted to find a permanent solution to the issue.”

Malook said the Supreme Court ordered a reply from the government after he highlighted the evidence in Nayab’s case and questioned the discrepancy between the penal laws and Sharia (Islamic law) over the minimum marriageable age for girls.

In Nayab’s case, the LHC dismissed her official birth documents showing she was 13, and instead accepted her claim under duress that she was 19 years old and had married Hayat, a married father of four children, after converting to Islam of her own free will in Gujranwala.

While Pakistani law recognizes intercourse with a girl below 16 years of age with or without consent as rape punishable by death, courts have repeatedly held that the marriage of an underage Muslim girl cannot be termed invalid because Islamic law holds that a consenting girl who has reached puberty can marry.

“The perpetrators forcibly convert their victims to Islam to escape punishments,” Malook said. “Therefore, it’s important to set a uniform age for marriage across Pakistan and ensure the implementation of the child marriage laws.”

The lawyer said that Nayab was not Sui Juris, that is, “in one’s own right” as an adult not under power or guardianship of another person, at the time of her alleged Islamic marriage with Hayat, and that therefore the marriage was invalid. Anyone who is no longer a minor is presumed to be Sui Juris.

“This is the first time that the Supreme Court will speak its mind on the legal age of marriage for minority girls,” Malook said. “Previously the Islamabad High Court and Federal Shariat Court have recommended fixing the marriageable age for girls, so we are hoping that the Supreme Court will give a landmark judgment on this matter.”

Rekindled Hope

The appeal’s outcome is significant in view of the serious concerns of the country’s religious minorities, especially Christians and Hindus, over growing incidents of forced conversion and marriages of minor girls with their Muslim abductors.

Church of Pakistan President Bishop Azad Marshall said the Supreme Court decision had “rekindled hope for the protection of our young girls.”

On July 14, 2021, Supreme Court Justice Mushir Alam rejected an appeal by Marshall calling for a constitutional petition to protect Christian girls from forced conversion and forced marriage. Alam said the petition was rejected because it did not address an individual case or grievance.

“I appeal to Christians across the world to pray for this crucial case, especially for the judges so that they make an earnest effort to protect our little girls,” Marshall said.

Nayab’s father, Shahid Gill, and mother, Samreen, were overjoyed when they heard about the Supreme Court’s decision to address the issue.

Gill said that Nayab had fled after Hayat was imprisoned in a case related to the abduction of his first wife.

Hayat is now free on bail and searching furiously for Nayab, he said.