Another prisoner moves PHC against death by hanging

PESHAWAR: Another death row prisoner on Tuesday moved the Peshawar High Court (PHC) to seek directives from the court to the government to introduce a less painful mode of execution instead of hanging to death.

Gul Wali, son of Said Ghaus, a death row prisoner imprisoned at the Haripur Central Prison, requested the high court to declare the mode of hanging to death as un-Islamic and unconstitutional as it was painful and against human values. He is the second prisoner in Haripur Central Prison seeking a less painful mode of execution. In the first case, the high court had stayed the execution of Jan Bahadur in a case of similar nature. The case is pending before the high court for decision.

The petitioner Gul Wali requested the high court in the petition to declare the mode of hanging to death as un-Islamic and unconstitutional. When the single bench headed by Justice Muhammad Ibrahim Khan took up the case for hearing, the petitioner's lawyer referred to section 368 of Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) that stated: "When any person is sentenced to death, the sentence shall direct that he be hanged by the neck till he is dead." The petitioner's counsel pointed out that there are nine modes of carrying out death penalties, including death by hanging, through firing squad, shooting in the head, by lethal injection, beheading, stoning to death, gas chamber, through electric chair, and pushing from height.