Charity accused of running sharia courts

LAHORE: A Pakistani judge has accepted a case against an Islamic charity, widely seen as a front organisation for a banned anti-India militant group, that has been accused of running unauthorised sharia courts in Lahore.

The charity, Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), is listed as a “foreign terrorist organisation” by the US. Western officials regard it as a front for Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the militant group that carried out the attack on Mumbai that killed 166 people in 2008.

The case against JuD was brought by a Pakistani real estate agent, Khalid Saeed, who says the charity had summoned him in January to appear at its court in Lahore to resolve a property dispute with another man.

Saeed said the JuD letter warned him that if he failed to attend, “no excuse would be accepted and action would be taken according to sharia”.

Pakistan’s judiciary has become increasingly assertive dealing with politicians, but the case could show how ready judges are to act against powerful Islamic organisations.

Lahore High Court Judge Shahid Bilal Hassan agreed to hear the case. He reserved judgment until a later date but told JuD’s lawyer that based “on facts, he (Khalid Saeed) has a point”.

There was no hearing yesterday, and it was unclear when the proceedings would continue.

Court documents show the group is accused of organising and holding parallel sharia courts, summoning individuals and deciding family, civil and criminal law cases in Lahore.

JuD officials deny having links to LeT or running a parallel court system.

Instead, JuD said it holds “arbitration councils” chaired by religious scholars who mediate disputes and provide guidance in light of Islamic teachings.

JuD operates openly in Pakistan and its leader Hafiz Saeed, who also founded LeT, holds public rallies and gives interviews despite a $10 million bounty placed on him by the US.

JuD officials last year said the group had 30 000 volunteers and hundreds of workers across Pakistan.

During Tuesday’s hearing, the JuD lawyer, Muhammad Aqeel, said the summons submitted by Saeed was forged.

A JuD representative, Nadeem Awan, said the group did not issue threats or summons.

“If we had been summoning people or coercing them to attend the council or abide by the council’s decisions, then there would be thousands of complaints against us. Yet, all you have is this one complaint,” Awan said.

Pakistan has a Federal Shariat Court separate from the supreme and high courts, and can examine if laws comply with Islam.

Many Pakistanis are frustrated with the formal judicial system, regarding it as flawed and slow, and they instead look for justice from parallel courts like panchayats, or village councils, or unauthorised sharia courts.

The man who asked the JuD to intervene in his dispute with the real estate agent said he had written to the group’s leader asking for help. “A friend told me about these courts and how effective they were,” Muhammad Azam said.

Inside the JuD headquarters in Lahore, a large banner had proclaimed the group’s “Mediatory Sharia Court” which was set up in 1992, and has since its inception decided “thousands of family, civil and murder disputes according to Islamic law”.

The banner, seen by a reporter, was taken down on Monday. – Reuters