Pakistani court seeks report on FIA officer urging lawyers not to defend blasphemy suspects

A Pakistani court on Thursday ordered the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to submit a detailed report after a video surfaced showing a senior cybercrime officer urging lawyers not to represent suspects in blasphemy cases.

Justice Sardar Ijaz Ishaq Khan of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) made the order during a hearing on a petition filed last year by families of 101 individuals accused in cyber blasphemy cases.

The petition called for an inquiry commission to investigate rising cyber blasphemy charges and alleged collusion between law enforcement and a gang accused of entrapping youth online.

Advocate Usman Warraich, representing the families, played a video in court showing FIA Additional Director Chaudhry Sarfaraz addressing members of the Lahore High Court Bar Association during a seminar.

In the video, Sarfaraz said that any Muslim, any human rights organization, any union, any country of the world cannot compel us to stop this work.

“We will catch these people (blasphemers),” Sarfaraz was heard saying in the video.

He also claimed that he has caught more than 400 individuals accused of blasphemy, and all of them are currently in jail.

“36 of them have been convicted after due process,” he added. Sarfaraz also requested lawyers not to take up cases of individuals accused of blasphemy.

“Please don’t humiliate yourselves in front of Allah and Prophet Muhammad (PBUH),” he said.

He also offered lawyers to visit his office and receive all the required details regarding the cases.

After the clip ended, Justice Ishaq asked Warraich about the officer’s rank and questioned whether it was appropriate for a senior FIA officer to publicly discourage legal defense for accused individuals.

“I don’t know, I am curious,” Justice Ishaq said. “Is it permitted for a senior officer of the FIA to make an impassioned plea in the bar that accused persons in blasphemy cases shouldn’t be represented? Is it permitted?”

The judge noted that an investigative officer is supposed to remain neutral.

“Here he is assuming the mantle of someone in uniform, but whose job is to tell the lawyers’ community not to represent blasphemy accused,” he added.

The FIA’s legal counsel responded that the officer spoke in his personal capacity at a seminar aimed at raising awareness against blasphemy. He also said that no lawyer had yet approached the FIA, as they had been deterred from taking such cases.

Justice Ishaq challenged that claim.

“It wasn’t in his personal capacity, he was saying, ‘we did all that, we apprehended that many people.’ He wasn’t invited as an expert in blasphemy law, he was invited as a leading investigative officer in the FIA,” the judge said.

He compared the scenario to a hypothetical situation in which a senior anti-narcotics officer tells lawyers not to defend drug couriers.

Justice Ishaq said the issue was not about the blasphemy law itself.

“This case is about the abuse of this law in collusion with some officers in the FIA,” he said. “The way he gave the presentation was beyond the call of duty.”

He directed FIA’s counsel to submit a proper report to the court, including references to the agency’s code of conduct and whether the officer’s remarks violated it.

The judge rejected a request by a lawyer from the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) party to show the full video of Sarfaraz’s speech.

“The part that is played is enough for me,” the judge said, asserting that it clearly showed bias.

Justice Ishaq also criticized the TLP lawyer’s broader narrative.

“You always try to show that this case is against blasphemy law. Your whole narrative is to show the world that this case is an attack on Namoos-e-Risalat,” he said.

“This commission will not look into whether Section 295-C of the Penal Code should remain. That is not the issue.”

The blasphemy business

Earlier this year, IHC ordered the government to constitute an inquiry commission to probe the rise in the number of cyber blasphemy cases in the country.

The order came after a petition was filed by the families of individuals accused of cyber blasphemy. The petition stated that the petitioners became aware of a January 2024 special report by the Special Branch of Punjab Police titled ‘The Blasphemy Business’.

As per the report, a suspicious gang was trapping youth in blasphemy cases and extorting money from them in connivance with the FIA in Rawalpindi and Islamabad.

The petition further alleged that this gang was reportedly the complainant in approximately 90% of blasphemy cases registered by the FIA. The group, comprising both men and women, operates under the banner of an organization called the ‘Legal Commission on Blasphemy’.

Over 400 individuals were claimed to have fallen victim to this alleged scheme, with 70% of them being men and women in their 20s or even younger.