SCHOLARSHIP ROUNDUP On Islamic Law In "The Role and Potential of Blockchain Technology in Islamic Finance" (European Business Law Review 33, no. 2 (2022)), Andrew Dahdal, Jon Druby, and Otabek Ismailov (Qatar University) "argue that blockchain has the ability to mediate and harmonise differing shariacompliance regimes thus opening up a single digital market for Islamic … Continue reading Weekend Scholarship Roundup
By Zainab Hashmi This post is part of the Digital Islamic Law Lab (DILL) series, in which a Harvard student analyzes a primary source of Islamic law, previously workshopped in the DIL Lab. Case Summary In September 2019, a Multan Sessions Court (state trial court) issued its decision in State v. Muhammad Waseem et al., a high-profile … Continue reading State v. Waseem et al. – Waiver of Qiṣāṣ and Taz‘īr in Honor Killing
By Zainab Hashmi This post is part of the Digital Islamic Law Lab (DILL) series, in which a Harvard student analyzes a primary source of Islamic law, previously workshopped in the DIL Lab. In October 2016, the Majlis-e-Shoora (Parliament) passed legislation amending the Pakistan Penal Code, 1860 (Act XLV of 1860) and the Code of Criminal Procedure, … Continue reading Criminal Law (Amendment): Offences in the Name or Pretext of Honor Act, 2016 Passed by Majlis-e-Shoora (Parliament) of Pakistan
By Zainab Hashmi This post is part of the Digital Islamic Law Lab (DILL) series, in which a Harvard student analyzes a primary source of Islamic law, previously workshopped in the DIL Lab. Source Summary Fatwā issued by Sunnī Ittehad Council of Pakistan on June 11, 2016.[1] This post comments on an official religious pronouncement (fatwā) issued … Continue reading The “unpardonable” sin of honor killing: A Fatwā
By Adnan Zulfiqar This post is the fourth and last in a series of four posts on obligation, jihād, revolution and prisons. Over the past several years, there has been a surge of interest in anti-carceral ideas in the United States arising out of greater public awareness of systemic problems in its criminal system. This … Continue reading Prisons, Abolition and Islamic Legal Discourse
Professor Intisar Rabb and Iran editor Marzieh Tofighi Darian analyze changes made to statutes defining juvenile crimes and punishment under Iran's new Islamic Penal Code, passed in 2013. The Code follows a traditional dichotomy between ḥudūd fixed crimes and qiṣāṣ retaliatory scheme (which are directly incorporated from classical Islamic law interpretations of criminal law into … Continue reading Commentary :: Iran’s New Islamic Penal Code: Have International Criticisms Been Effective for Children and Juvenile Offenders?
By Nimra Azmi In March 2015, the Pakistani Senate unanimously passed the Anti-Rape Laws Bill of 2014. (While the Anti-Rape Laws Bill has passed in the upper house, it is awaiting approval of the National Assembly or the lower house of the Pakistani Parliament, the Majlis-e-Shura.[1]) This Bill is the most recent major move made … Continue reading Pakistan’s Anti-Rape Laws Bill: Panacea or Posturing?
By Nimra Azmi In 1999, Pakistan passed an amendment to the 1997 Anti-Terrorism Act.[1] This Amendment listed gang rape, child molestation, and robbery coupled with rape as terrorist acts under the ATA. When the 1999 Amendment was passed, rape (zinā' bi'l jabr), which included the ATA sexual offenses, was governed by the Zina Ordinance, a … Continue reading A Patchwork Pakistani: Gang Rape, Jurisdiction, and the Mukhtar Mai Case
By Nimra Azmi Pakistan’s 2006 Protection of Women Act (PWA) should have been a victory for progressive Pakistani forces, a definitive end to the 1979 Hudood Ordinances’ draconian reign over rape in Pakistan.[1] The actual landscape, however, is not so clear-cut. While not commonly discussed in the narrative of Pakistani rape law, a 2010 Federal … Continue reading The Protection of Women Act vs. the Hudood Ordinance: A Federal Shariat Court Challenge
By Nimra Azmi From 1979 until 2006, the Zina Ordinance, a subsection of the Hudood Ordinances, governed rape under Pakistani law.[1] The Hudood Ordinances were implemented during the rule of President Zia ul-Haq, who presided over the country from 1977-1988 as a military dictator. Representing a conservative Islamic orthodoxy of a Ḥanafī bent, Zia ul-Haq … Continue reading Rape & the Hudood Ordinance: A Lost Opportunity
