The Supreme Court on Tuesday upheld the death sentence of Zahir Jaffer for the gruesome murder of Noor Mukadam nearly four years ago that had shook the nation.
After the ruling by the top court, a presidential pardon under Article 45 of the Constitution could possibly provide Zahir pardon, or reprieve, or remit, suspend or commute his sentence.
Noor, aged 27 years, was found murdered at Zahir’s Islamabad residence in July 2021, with the probe revealing she was tortured before being beheaded. Zahir’s death sentence by the trial court had already been upheld by the Islamabad High Court (IHC).
A three-member bench, led by Justice Hashim Kakar and inlcuding Justices Ishtiaq Ibrahim and Ali Baqar Najafi, presided today over the third hearing of Zahir’s appeal against his death sentence.
The bench upheld Zahir’s death sentence handed by two courts previously over the murder charges under under Section 302(b) (premeditated murder) of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).
However, it converted the IHC’s decision of a second death penalty over rape charges into life sentence. The high court had turned Zahir’s 25 years of rigorous imprisonment under Section 376 of the PPC into a death sentence.
The 10 years of rigorous imprisonment, which was accompanied with a fine of Rs100,000, for kidnapping in order to murder under was reduced to one year of jail term.
The apex court maintained the earlier orders to the accused to pay Rs0.5 million to Noor’s legal heir.
The appeals of two co-accused — Mohammad Iftikhar (watchman) and Jan Mohammad (gardener) — against their 10-year sentences were also taken up by the SC. Their sentences were reduced, with the bench deciding their detention so far was sufficient.
A short order on today’s hearing is yet to be issued.
Barrister Salman Safdar appeared as Zahir’s counsel while Advocate Shah Khawar was present on behalf of Noor’s father, retired diplomat Shaukat Mukadam. Safdar concluded his arguments today, while Khawar also presented his.
At the outset of the hearing, Zahir’s counsel contended that any evidence against his client “must be beyond doubt”, arguing that the court could not “go beyond the footage presented in the court”.
He said the prosecution presented the footage on a USB at the IHC, but it could not be played.
At this point, a lawyer for the two co-accused presented his arguments briefly. He detailed their sentences, recalling that the watchman and gardener were accused of “stopping the victim from fleeing”.
Justice Najafi observed, “If the suspects had not stopped the victim, then the situation would have been different.”
The lawyer asserted that the two co-accused had “no crime other than being present in the house” at the time of the murder.
“What was the need to work more than [what] the salary [is paid for]?” Justice Kakar remarked.
When the hearing resumed in the afternoon after a break, the counsel of Noor’s father presented his arguments.
During the previous hearing, the accused’s lawyer contended that no medical board was formed to assess his client’s mental state. Justice Kakar had observed, “A daughter was mercilessly murdered.”
In October last year, Noor’s father had urged the SC to take up the murder case pending for more than one and a half years in the top court.
Case history
Noor, 27, was found murdered at a residence in Islamabad’s upscale Sector F-7/4 on July 20, 2021. An FIR was registered later the same day against Zahir Jaffer, who was arrested at the site of the murder.
In February 2022, a district and sessions judge sentenced Jaffer to death for the murder and handed him 25 years of rigorous imprisonment, finding him guilty of rape. His household staff, Mohammad Iftikhar and Jan Mohammad — co-accused in the case — were each sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Zahir’s parents, leading businessman Zakir Jaffer and Asmat Adamji, had been indicted by an Islamabad district and sessions court in October 2021 but were later acquitted by the court.
Six officials of Therapy Works, whose employees had visited the site of the murder before police, were also among those indicted by the lower court but were later freed of the charges along with the parents. According to the challan, the parents and the therapy workers tried to conceal the crime and attempted to destroy the evidence.
In March 2023, the IHC, dismissing the Zahir’s appeal, not only upheld the death sentence but also converted his 25-year jail term into another death penalty. The IHC had also rejected the pleas of the main suspect’s staff challenging their conviction.
The next month, Zahir approached the SC against the IHC verdict, insisting that his conviction resulted from “erroneous appreciation” of the case evidence and the high court and trial court could not identify the “fundamental flaws” in the FIR.
Brutal murder
After an FIR was registered in the case and Zahir was arrested, his parents and household staff were also taken into custody by police on July 24, 2021 over allegations of “hiding evidence and being complicit in the crime”. They were made a part of the investigation based on the statement of Noor’s father but were later acquitted.
In his complaint, Shaukat had stated that he had gone to Rawalpindi on July 19 to buy a goat for Eidul Azha, while his wife had gone out to pick up clothes from her tailor. When he had returned home in the evening, the couple found their daughter Noor absent from their house in Islamabad.
They had found her cellphone number switched off and started a search for her. Sometime later, Noor had called her parents to inform them that she was travelling to Lahore with some friends and would return in a day or two, according to the FIR.
The complainant said he had later received a call from Zahir, whose family were their acquaintances. Zahir had informed Shaukat that Noor was not with him, the FIR said.
At around 10pm on July 20, the victim’s father had received a call from Kohsar police station, informing him that Noor had been murdered.
Police had subsequently taken the complainant to Zahir’s house in Sector F-7/4 where he discovered that his “daughter has been brutally murdered with a sharp-edged weapon and beheaded”, according to the FIR.
Shaukat, who identified his daughter’s body, had sought the maximum punishment under the law against Zahir for allegedly murdering his daughter.
Police later said that Zahir had confessed to killing Noor, while his DNA test and fingerprints also showed his involvement in the murder.
