PESHAWAR: Peshawar High Court has upheld the conviction and death sentence on three counts of a man convicted of sexually assaulting and killing a nine-year-old girl in Mardan district over six years ago.

A bench consisting of Justice Sahibzada Asadullah and Justice Inamullah Khan rejected an appeal filed by convict Akhtar Hussain and declared: “Having independently reappraised the evidence as well as the question of sentence, we find no justification for interference with the conclusion reached by the learned trial court.”

The trial court in Mardan had convicted Hussain on Aug 27, 2025, under provisions of Pakistan Penal Code and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Child Protection and Welfare Act and sentenced him to death on three counts for abducting, sexually assaulting and killing the minor girl and fined him a sum of Rs1.6 million.

The girl had gone missing on March 26, 2020, in the jurisdiction of the Sheikh Maltoon police station in Mardan district. Her body, stuffed in a sack, was found in a water channel the next day.

Discusses ‘erosion of moral consciousness’ in verdict

The appellant, a neighbour of the girl, recorded a statement with a magistrate confessing to the crime.

“The appellant was not a child incapable of appreciating consequences, but a mature married man with two wives. Yet a helpless minor, entitled to nothing but protection from the adults around her, became the object of his sexual desire,” the bench observed in its 34-page detailed judgement in the case.

It noted that what began with lust ended with the extinguishment of an innocent life.

“The child lost everything in a moment; her parents were left with a grief that no judgement can repair.”

The judgement authored by Justice Sahibzada Asadullah said an offence against a child of that nature travelled beyond the immediate physical injury inflicted upon the victim and that it wounded the sense of security upon which a civilised society rested.

It added that human dignity was not measured by the strength of the powerful, but by the protection afforded to the weak.

“The law could not restore this child to her parents; it could only ensure that her vulnerability did not become a reason for her suffering to pass without lawful consequence,” it ruled.

The court also discussed in detail degradation of moral values and increase in such cases, observing that what is perhaps more disturbing than the occurrence of a particular crime is the gradual erosion of the moral consciousness that enables a society to distinguish between right and wrong, virtue and vice, humanity and brutality.

“The teachings of morality, compassion, dignity, restraint and respect for human life, which were meant to guide our individual and collective conduct, seem increasingly to have been overshadowed by indifference, selfishness and a disturbing disregard for the sanctity of human life,” it observed.

The bench maintained that those were not merely isolated incidents of criminality and instead, they’re warning signs of a deeper malaise.

It added that every such occurrence, particularly when directed against the weak, the helpless and those incapable of protecting themselves, struck at the very conscience of society.

“If such conduct is allowed to pass without an appropriate response from the law, the distinction between lawfulness and lawlessness would gradually become blurred, and the foundations upon which a civilised society rests would inevitably be weakened. The law, therefore, can’t remain a silent spectator to such moral and social degeneration,” it declared.

The bench maintained that it couldn’t afford to permit that moral descent to become the accepted order of the day.

It added that the administration of criminal justice carried with it a solemn responsibility, not merely to determine the guilt or innocence of an accused in accordance with the law but also to ensure that the protection afforded by the law to human life, dignity and fundamental societal values was neither diluted nor rendered meaningless.

“A civilised society is ultimately measured by the manner in which it responds to injustice. If the guilty are permitted to escape the consequences of their proved acts, particularly in cases involving the most vulnerable members of society, the resulting injustice is not confined to the victim alone; it wounds the collective conscience of society,” it said.

The court added that conversely, when the law was applied fairly, fearlessly and in accordance with due process, it reaffirmed the fundamental proposition that no person is above the law and that every human life possesses a dignity which the legal order is bound to protect.

“Where an offence is proved, the law must provide an effective and proportionate response; otherwise, the very purpose of the criminal justice system would stand frustrated. It is in this perspective that we approach the present case,” it noted in the judgement.

Published in Dawn, September 12th, 2026