9-year-old girl married off to 32-year-old on jirga’s order in Swat

SWAT: A 9-year-old girl was married off to a 32-year-old man on jirga’s order in Swat, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, ARY News reported on Wednesday.

As per details,  in Swat’s Manglor area, police have launched an investigation after a nine-year-old girl was forced into marriage with a 32-year-old man under the orders of a local jirga.

The girl’s uncle, Syed Rehman, had abducted the woman four months earlier. Following the jirga’s decision to “give” the nine-year-old in marriage, the wedding was carried out.

This incident follows a similar case in Attock, where a 12-year-old girl was forcibly married to a 70-year-old man by her stepfather.

A case has been registered against ten individuals, including the officiant of the marriage, for coercing the girl into the wedding. Hazro police arrested the groom, Naim, along with his four siblings and four others, totaling nine arrests.

The stepfather of the 12-year-old girl in the Attock case, Tayyab, was also taken into custody, while the officiant of that forced marriage remains at large.

Last year, police registered a new case against Asmat Ullah Khan, the chief of a local jirga, in connection with the murder of Sidra Arab, who was allegedly killed on the orders of jirga in Rawalpindi’s Fauji Colony.

The case was filed under the Punjab Arms Ordinance 2015 based on a complaint by the police.

During the investigation, the suspect, Asmat Ullah, confessed to carrying a Kalashnikov rifle to Muzaffarabad on July 16 to retrieve Sidra Arab. He admitted to entering the home of Sidra’s second husband, Usman, with the weapon, accompanied by Saleh Muhammad, Amani Gul, and others.