A two-member Supreme Court bench has suspended the Peshawar High Court (PHC) decision and ordered the distribution of the property of a deceased person among all the legal heirs in accordance with the Islamic law. The case was heard by Justice Qazi Faez Isa and Justice Yahya Afridi pertaining to a property dispute in Swat. Justice Qazi Faez Isa remarked that the decision of ‘Jirga’ in the said case was not greater than the divine religion. According to reports, the heirs of Habibullah, a resident of Swat, had approached the apex court for equal distribution of their property after a Jirga’s decision to distribute property among them. During the hearing, Justice Isa noted that Islamic law of inheritance regarding the distribution of property among heirs could not be altered by the judiciary or ‘Jirgas’ and these laws were settled 1,400 years ago. According to reports, a seven-year-old kid was made witness to the Jirga’s decision and his thumbprint was stamped on the property distribution documents. While counsel for the petitioner pleaded the court to consider the ground realities of the area while hearing the case. The court expressed annoyance that the counsel was treating women as the lesser human being.
The state of Pakistan came into existence more than seven decades ago and the national constitution of the country was passed in 1973. The Islamic laws of inheritance were incorporated in the constitution of Pakistan without any alteration; therefore, no Muslim subject of the country can evade the law at any pretext. However, there is a general trend in our society that the majority of the families, clans and tribes do not give due share to the women in property of their parents. Usually people give different reasons, such as some do not want the division of land of their parents, some stated a meagerness of the property for division, and some suggest paying through dowry etc. Therefore, people take shelter of jirga, family tradition, and tribal laws to bar allotment of share to female inheritances of the deceased. As far as Jirga is concerned, it can not substitute for the law of the country and there are no qualification criteria for its members to decide legal matters.
Historically, Jirga had always played the role of thugs and favored the influential, furthermore Jirga’s decision was never as per Islamic or country’s laws but usually takes its own way while considering so-called ground realities or tribal traditions as mentioned by the learned counsel in Habibullah case. As practice is vague, mostly the rights of ownership of women in inheritance are violated by their family members by means of coercion, fabrication, fraud, forgery or cheating with the rightful women heirs. According to a report of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission, women had been married to the Quran to avoid redistribution of the land in various parts of the country.
There had been numerous legislations over the years to pause the illegal forfeiture of women ownership rights in inheritance including Muslim Personal Laws, Pakistan Panel Code Act 2005, and women’s property rights bill 2019, which criminalized the act of depriving women from their share in inheritance through deceit or marriage with Quran. However, the regrettable practice could not be halted so far. In fact, there is a need to strengthen the legal system through implementing the laws in the country.
https://thefrontierpost.com/law-of-inheritance-and-plight-of-women/
