From CNN, writers Farid Ahmed and Moni Basu give us the graphic details.
Mahbub Khan came back to Shariatpur from a stint working in Malaysia. His son was Hena's age and the two were in seventh grade together.
Khan eyed Hena and began harassing her on her way to school and back, said Hena's father. He complained to the elders who run the village about his nephew, three times Hena's age.
The elders admonished Mahbub Khan and ordered him to pay $1,000 in fines to Hena's family. But Mahbub was Darbesh's older brother's son and Darbesh was asked to let the matter fade.
Many months later on a winter night, as Hena's sister Alya told it, Hena was walking from her room to an outdoor toilet when Mahbub Khan gagged her with cloth, forced her behind nearby shrubbery and beat and raped her.
Hena struggled to escape, Alya told CNN. Mahbub Khan's wife heard Hena's muffled screams and when she found Hena with her husband, she dragged the teenage girl back to her hut, beat her and trampled her on the floor.
The next day, the village elders met to discuss the case at Mahbub Khan's house, Alya said. The imam pronounced his fatwa. Khan and Hena were found guilty of an illicit relationship. Her punishment under sharia or Islamic law was 101 lashes; his 201.
Mahbub Khan managed to escape after the first few lashes.
Darbesh Khan and Aklima Begum had no choice but to mind the imam's order. They watched as the whip broke the skin of their youngest child and she fell unconscious to the ground.
"What happened to Hena is unfortunate and we all have to be ashamed that we couldn't save her life," said Sultana Kamal, who heads the rights organization Ain o Shalish Kendro.
Bangladesh is considered a democratic and moderate Muslim country, and national law forbids the practice of sharia. But activist and journalist Shoaib Choudhury, who documents such cases, said sharia is still very much in use in villages and towns aided by the lack of education and strong judicial systems.
2 comments:
What happened to this girl is horrible and should be condemned by any means and this Imam has to be tried. HOWEVER, this does not mean that SHARIAH is the problem. Shariah law never said to beat someone who was raped.
End this double standard people! When it comes to other faith, no one would for example claim the bible is wrong because some extremist KKK just burned the house of an afro american. Or would the west question the whole Catholic church because there were some cases of pedophily. No.
The Shariah was clearly not applied to this girl. If it were, then the following scenarios would have been seen.
If she was married and here husband accused her of adultery, and there were no 4 independent eye witnesses to confirm this, He would be asked to swear 3 times and wish the curse of Allah on himself if he were to lie. Then the woman would be asked to confirm or refute the accusation. If she swears also 3 times that her husband is lying,
then she is free of any charges.
If she was proven to be guilty ( meaning she did not refute the accusation, or there were 4 eye witnesses that did not call one another to actually see the act being done (which would be a very rare case unless you are blatantly having sex in a car in the middle of time square at 12 pm)), then she and the man who she was with will be sentenced to death.
If she was NOT married, and accused of fornication in this case, no death sentence applies. If she recognizes explicitely that she has been involved in fornication or if 4 independent eye witnesses can say that they saw the act being done "like the rope in the well", or if the woman and pregnant and cannot justify it (did not say she was raped, or ignored the interdiction of fornication,etc...) then she and the man are sentenced to receive 100 lashes and forced to exile for 1 year. The woman is not forced to leave if it might but her in an uncomfortable situation.
Again, this so called imam clearly did not apply Shariah in this case.
What planet are you on, Sharia Law is discusting!
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