The case of arson and rampage in the Christian neighborhood of Jaranwala town in the industrial district of Faisalabad, the most recent act of violence against the religious minority, will be heard by a bench of three members of the Supreme Court (SC).
After clerics made announcements in the mosques inciting the mob to attack the Christian community on the basis of allegations of blasphemy, on August 16, a crowd in Jaranwala vandalized several churches and set dozens of houses on fire.
Christian homes that had been abandoned by their owners in response to protests from mosques were also looted by the violent mob that set fire to.
The bench, which includes Justice Muneeb Akhtar and Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, will be headed by Justice Ijaz-Ul-Ahsan.
Under a variety of petitions, Minority Leader Samuel Pyaray had asked the Supreme Court to consider the Jaranwala tragedy.
A hearing on the petition has been scheduled for the second time.
A three-member bench consisting of himself, Justice Athar Minallah, and Justice Shahid Waheed was established by CJP Bandial last month to hear pleas related to the Jaranwala incident.
The seat was supposed to take up the case on August 22 and notification were given to every one of the gatherings for the situation.
However, it was later discovered that the Human Rights Cell had not received the incident police report, so the Supreme Court postponed the hearing on the matter.
Petitioner Pyare had stated to Geo News at the time, "I was told by the Supreme Court that the case is scheduled for hearing tomorrow [Tuesday] but if was informed later that the Human Rights Cell report on the incident has not yet been received which is why the hearing will not be held."
More than 5,000 people had entered the neighborhood from other districts at one point, with smaller groups moving on to narrow alleys to rob homes.
Christian families fled their burned-out homes and were attacked after the incident, and some of them moved to other areas to visit relatives. They spent the night in fields and other abandoned locations to protect themselves.
In Jaranwala, arsonists had been charged in two cases with terrorism and blasphemy, along with 13 other charges. 37 people were named as suspects, and over 600 people who had not been identified were included in the investigation.
The Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) had two men arrested a day after the incident at a mosque in Jaranwala, Faisalabad, on suspicion of making statements that encouraged violence against minority religious institutions.
The Pakistan Ulema Council (PUC) and Church of Pakistan jointly established a 24-member committee on August 20 in an effort to investigate the tragic incident in Faisalabad's Jaranwala, foster interfaith and interdenominational unity, and dispel extremist narratives.
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