Supreme Court Justice Athar Minallah on Friday called extrajudicial killings, custodial torture and excessive use of force the “most intolerable crimes” in a democratic society, calling them “the worst form of violation” of the Constitution.
In his dissenting note on the court’s judgment delivered in a case related to the murder of Mohammad Hayat Mirza, a student of Karachi University, Turbat, Justice Minallah said there can be “no tolerance” for such acts and conduct by law enforcement agencies and their members.
In 2020, police arrested a Frontier Corps (FC) soldier, Shadiullah, on charges of killing Mirza and launched an investigation after registering a case against him. The case against the suspect was registered following the complaint of Mohammad Murad Baloch, brother of the deceased.
The convicted man had appealed to the Supreme Court after his sentence handed down by a court of first instance. The trial court, in its judgment dated January 20, 2021, convicted the appellant under section 302(b) (premeditated murder) of the Pakistan Penal Code and sentenced him to death.
However, the SC delivered its 2-1 majority verdict on Shadiullah’s statement on September 17, 2025, and a written order was issued yesterday. According to the verdict, the death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
The ruling was delivered by a three-member bench comprising Justices Athar Minallah, Irfan Saadat Khan and Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan, among whom Justice Minallah dissented.
“In a society where grievances related to enforced disappearances, excessive use of force, abuse of power, extrajudicial executions and violation of fundamental rights by law enforcement forces are widespread, impunity for crimes committed against citizens becomes the most aggravated form of transgression of the law,” said Judge Minallah.
“The severity is intensified when a citizen is the victim of an assault by a law enforcement agency or its officers and members,” he said. “Any act or conduct of that type is intolerable in a society governed by the Constitution.”
Judge Minallah said the rule of law is “eroded” when law enforcers take the law into their own hands and “appropriate the role of judge and executor”, adding that the appellant had abused his position of authority and trust.
“Officers and members are provided with weapons and ammunition for exclusive use to protect the people and serve them in their best interest,” he said in his note.
“As a uniformed and disciplined force, every officer and member of FC Balochistan is presumed to be highly trained and each of them will demonstrably demonstrate high standards of professionalism and exemplary conduct at all times in dealing with the civilian population for whose benefit they have been entrusted with onerous duties and obligations,” he stated.
Deterrent punishment, he said, is not only about maintaining a balance between the severity of the wrong committed by a person, but also about “making the offender an example for others as a preventive measure for the reform of society.”
“In the case of heinous crimes committed premeditatedly and in a gruesome manner, no leniency should be shown towards the guilty,” Judge Minallah said.
