In the wake of lynching of a student at Abdul Wali Khan University, Mardan, by a mob on April 13 the Supreme Court judgment in the murder case of Punjab governor Salman Taseer has assumed importance as it had ruled against religious vigilantism and declared that nobody could be allowed to take the law into his own hands.

The killing of Mashal Khan has turned into a test case for different components of criminal justice system, including police, prosecution and judiciary.

The investigation into Mashal`s case is in progress and police have so far arrested 35 suspects. Most of the suspects were arrested on the basis of certain video footages which surfaced after the occurrence.

One of the video footages clearly shows presence of policemen in a large number, but still some members of the mob are visible stopping and searching vehicles at the entrance of the university so as to check that the body of the deceased student as well as two other students accused by them of committing blasphemy should not be taken out.

While certain quarters have now been trying to depict the incident as an outcome of `grave and sudden provocation` to save the perpetrators, the historical judgment of the Supreme Court could serve as a guideline to the prosecutors as well as trial court.

The judgment delivered by a three-member bench on Oct 7, 2015 whereby appeal of the convict Malik Mumtaz Qadri was dismissed and death penalty awarded to him by an anti-terrorism court was upheld provided in depth discussion on different aspects of that famous case and clearly ruled that nobody could be permitted to take the law into his own hands on pretext of accusing someone of blasphemy.

In the murder case of Salman Taseer, an anti-terrorism court had convicted Mumtaz Qadri on Oct 1, 2011 under Section 302 (b) of Pakistan Penal Code and sentenced him to death. Furthermore, the court had also convicted him under Section 7 (a) of AntiTerrorism Act, 1997, and sentenced him to death.

A bench of the Islamabad High Court had upheld his conviction on March 9, 2015, under Section 302 (b) of the PPC, but his appeal was partly allowed as his conviction under the ATA was set aside. However, the apex court had concurred with the judgment of the ATC and had ruled that the killing was an act of terrorism.

The counsels appearing for Mumtaz Qadri had adopted different arguments, firstly trying for acquittal of their client, and secondly, if acquittal was not possible then to commute his sentence of death on grounds of mitigating circumstances. However, those arguments could not impress the apex court.

`If the asserted religious motivation of the appellant for the murder committed by him by taking the law into his own hands is to be accepted as a valid mitigating circumstance in this case then a door shall become open for religious vigilantism which may deal a mortal blow to the rule of law in this country where divergent religious interpretations abound and tolerance stands depleted to an alarming level,` the bench had ruled in its detailed judgment.

The bench headed by Justice Asif Saeed Khosa had ruled: `The law of the land does not permit an individual to arrogate unto himself the roles of a complainant, prosecutor, judge and executioner.

The bench had ruled that the appellant had acted in this case on the basis of nothing but hearsay and he had murdered the serving governor of his province without making any effort whatsoever to get his information about commission of blasphemy verified or confirmed.

The court had also turned down the appellant`s plea that criticising the law regarding blasphemy by Mr Taseer also amounted to committing blasphemy.

After lengthy discussion, the bench had ruled that any call for reforming of the law regarding the offence of blasphemy ought not to be mistaken as a call for doing away with that law and it ought to be understood as a call for introducing adequate safeguards against malicious application or use of that law by motivated persons.

The bench ruled that in a democratic society the citizens had a right to contend, debate, or maintain that a law had not been correctly framed by the state in terms of the mischief sought to be suppressed or that the law promulgated by the state ought to contain adequate safeguards against its misapplication or misuse by motivated persons.

An expert in criminal cases said that by now the provincial government should have assigned the lynching case to a competent prosecutor as this was not an ordinary criminal case.

He added that the concerned prosecutor and court would be definitely under pressure from certain quarters and conviction of the perpetrators would be an uphill task for the prosecution.