“Daily Times, December 26, 2007.

LAHORE: A nine-year-old girl was allegedly forced to marry her 35-year-old physically handicapped cousin to settle a gambling debt. The incident took place in Akhtarabad near Okara on Tuesday. The husband is the girl’s cousin and cannot hear or speak. The girl’s father owed gambling money to his sister-in-law’s husband and in exchange married off his daughter to his sister-in-law’s son.”

This event took place in a Muslim country and in a Muslim family. Nobody has blamed Islam for this criminal act. It has nothing to do with Islam as a religion or as a part of the code of Islamic way of life.

In the case of Aqsa the criminal act of murdering her has nothing to do with Islam and no body (Dr. Qazi included) is putting the responsibility on the religion Islam. The responsibility of Islam comes in with the prescribed code of behaviour for Muslim women. This notion of HijAb is indeed present in the Holy Book (post 079, Mubashir Inayet).As a believer the father of Aqsa, Mohammad Pervez was trying to follow the scripture. For this initial part of Father’s act, Islam (not as a religion but as a complete code of life) is to be blamed.