I’d never thought I would say this, but Pakistan has set a new example for us in ‘swift justice’. In the Zainab Ansari rape and murder case, the accused has been given a death penalty on four counts within four days of court proceedings.
On January 4, 2018, 6-year-old Zainab Ansari, while going for a Quran class, went missing. 5 days later, on January 9, her body was found by the police. According to the autopsy report, she had been raped and strangled to death. It also revealed that she had been kept captive and tortured before death. This horrifying crime caused an uproar throughout the Kasur district, where the crime had happened, and the rest of Pakistan. During a clash between the police and the protestors, 2 people also lost their lives.
24-year-old Imran Ali, a neighbour of Zainab’s grandmother, who she was living with at the time of the crime, became the prime suspect. He was traced by his jacket worn at the time of Zainab’s kidnapping and he, later, confessed to his crimes.
On February 17, 2018, an anti-terrorism court in Lahore Central Jail found him guilty of raping and murdering Zainab Ansari and several other minor girls. According to the reports, he confessed to assaulting ten minor girls and murdering five. So, Zainab wasn’t his first and wouldn’t have been his last had he not been caught.
The court awarded him four counts of the death penalty on counts of kidnap, rape, murder and committing an act of terrorism. A life sentence was awarded for sodomy and a fine of Rs 3.2 million on account of disposing of the body in a garbage pile.
With the swift action that Pakistani Judiciary took, it set an example for countries all over the world. In India, where rape cases are a common occurrence and the accused often get away, the 2012 Nirbhaya rape case shook the country to its core. It’s been six years since then and while the sentence has been announced, we’re still waiting for justice to be delivered.
Images: Daily Express, CBS News