By Asim Hussain
ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court has held that the courts must exercise extreme caution when handling cases involving matters of faith.
Chief Justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa authored a five-page judgment while granting bail to an accused charged with distributing a proscribed book, Tafseer-e-Sagheer.
The judgment expressed concern that emotions often overshadow facts in cases related to offences against religion, where individual complainants take precedence over the state. The CJP highlighted the nature of such offences, emphasising that they are not against individuals or personal property.
“We regretfully note that in dealing with cases pertaining to offences against religion facts give way to emotions, as seems to have happened in this case too, and individual complainants supplant the State, even though the very nature of these offences is not against an individual or with regard to personal property,” the order read.
The counsel for the petitioner stated that distributing/disseminating a proscribed book was made an offence by the Punjab Holy Quran (Printing and Recording) (Amendment) Act in the year 2021 whereas the FIR alleged that the petitioner had done this in 2019.
The accused had been charged with distributing a proscribed book in 2019, and the judgment noted that the Constitution prohibits charging someone for an act that was not an offence when committed.
The court ruled that since distributing the book was not an offence in 2019, the petitioner could not be charged for it.
