Khadija's appeal referred to Justice Asif Khosa bench

A Supreme Court (SC) bench on Sunday referred an appeal, filed against the acquittal of a convict in Khadija Stabbing case, to a bench, headed by Justice Asif Saeed Khan Khosa for hearing. The two-member bench, headed by Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar, passed the orders while hearing a suo motu notice against the acquittal of the convict by the Lahore High Court in Khadija Siddiqui case, here at the Supreme Court Lahore Registry.
As the proceedings began, victim Khadija Siddiqui along her counsel Barrister Salman Safdar appeared before the bench. In response to a query, Barrister Salman Safdar stated that an appeal had been filed with the Supreme Court against the acquittal of convict Shah Hussain by the Lahore High Court.
At this, the chief justice referred the appeal to the bench, headed by Justice Asif Saeed Khan Khosa, observing that suo motu had become in fructuous after filing of the appeal by the complainant. To which, Khadija Siddiqui submitted that she was being vilified, and demanded dispensation of justice to her.
The chief justice also criticized Shah Hussain's father Tanvir Hashmi, who was present in the court and asked: "How did you pass a resolution against the Supreme Court? How did you run a campaign against the court? Had this happened to the daughter of a lawyer, would you have behaved in the same way?"
It is pertinent to mention here that Advocate Tanvir Hashmi, father of Shah Hussain, had presented the said resolution in the Lahore High Court Bar, which regretted the suo motu notice against acquittal of the convict in Khadija case. Khadija Siddiqui, a student at a private law college, was allegedly attacked by her class fellow Shah Hussain on May 3, 2016 near Shimla Hill where she, along with her driver, had gone to pick her younger sister from school.
On July 29, 2017, a judicial magistrate handed down seven years imprisonment to Shah Hussain for stabbing his classmate Khadija Siddiqui. However, a district and sessions judge reduced Shah Hussain's seven-year imprisonment term to five years on an appeal by him. Shah Hussain had challenged the verdict before Lahore High Court who acquitted him after giving benefit of doubt.