Overview
- The Supreme Court set aside a rape conviction previously upheld by a trial court and the Lahore High Court by reclassifying the offense as fornication.
- The majority reduced the sentence from 20 years to five, citing a seven-month delay in filing the FIR and the absence of injury marks despite DNA evidence noted in coverage.
- The NCSW says prosecution findings were effectively disregarded and stresses that consent cannot be inferred from silence, delayed reporting, or lack of physical resistance.
- The Commission urges survivor-centred, gender-responsive adjudication grounded in constitutional guarantees of equality and dignity and in Pakistan’s international human rights obligations.
- It calls for more specialized GBV courts, permanent judges, and large-scale sensitization training for justice sector staff, while a dissenting justice warns against treating reporting delays as fatal to prosecution.