Defamation suit: Meesha accuses judge of bias, demands case transfer

LAHORE: Meesha Shafi on Saturday accused the judge hearing a defamation suit moved by her fellow singer Ali Zafar of being biased against her.

Expressing distrust in Additional Sessions Judge Shakeel Ahmed, Meesha Shafi, through her counsel pleaded with the sessions judge Lahore to fix the suit before another judge for hearing.

Ms Shafi alleged the judge seized with the hearing of the defamation suit is biased against her, adding he assisted witnesses in recording their testimonies and expressed annoyance over his counsel without any plausible reason.

She, therefore, demanded that the case be transferred from the court of Judge Ahmed who has been hearing it for the past six months.

After hearing arguments of her counsel, the judge reserved a verdict on her application seeking transfer of case to another court.

The singer-cum-actor, Ali Zafar, had taken Ms Shafi to a Lahore court last year in June after the latter accused him of sexual harassment. He requested the court to direct her to tender an apology over levelling baseless allegations and pay Rs1 billion in damages.

Read Also: Eyewitnesses contradict Meesha Shafi’s claim of harassment by Ali Zafar

In a post shared on micro-blogging site Twitter, Meesha Shafi claimed that she had been subjected to sexual harassment “of a physical nature” by Ali Zafar on multiple occasions.

Today, for the 8th time, our witnesses, including women, had to come back from the court as the other party has now filed an application to change the honourable judge.

— Barrister Ambreen Qureshi (@ambreenqureshi) May 4, 2019

The singer-cum-actress used the hashtag #MeToo to link it with an international movement against sexual harassment and assault.

In his first response to allegations leveled by Meesha Shafi, Ali Zafar had categorically denied all the allegations but had announced to take the matter to courts of law.