By Asghar Ali Mubarak
ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Friday dismissed a petition seeking to restrict the Aurat March as non-maintainable and not justiciable.
IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah dismissed the petition saying the right of assembly is a fundamental right but he stated that the court expects that the participants of the march will exercise their rights in accordance with the law. While dismissing the petition, the top judge highlighted the following points:
Courts across the country are inundated with litigation brought by women against the denial of their inheritance rights. “Mothers, sisters and daughters are denied their rights which have been expressly given to them by Almighty Allah in unambiguous terms.” In this context, and in view of widespread violence prevalent against women in the country, the International Women’s Day should be observed as “a day of introspection”.
“The petitioners and citizens are expected to take [the march] as an opportunity to introspect and demonstrably show outrage against the practices, which are flagrantly offensive to the injunctions of Islam e.g. mindsets that do not welcome the birth of a female child, honour killings, rape, practices such as wani, swara, karo-kari, etc. The words used in Aurat March slogans “should not be given meanings according to the mindset of a certain section of society and that too, contrary to the explanation given by the proponents of the march”.
