On October 6, Wednesday, a Pakistan court indicted actress Saba Qamar and her co-star and singer Bilal Saeed in a case registered against them in August last year. A case had been registered against the ‘Hindi Medium’ actress in Pakistan pertaining to the shooting of a music video in the historic Wazir Khan mosque located in the old city of Lahore.
The two were charged with desecration of the mosque by Pakistani judicial magistrate Javeria Bhatti. The court has scheduled the next hearing in the case on October 14 and directed the prosecution to present its witnesses on that day.
Meanwhile, both the actress and the singer have pleaded before the court ‘not guilty’. They said they would contest the trial.
Speaking on the issue, the actress asserted that she was booked under “baseless facts”. “No dance or music took place at the mosque. I am falsely implicated in this case,” she pleaded before the court.
The controversy surrounding a video shot by actress Saba Qamar in Wazir Khan mosque in Pakistan
A huge controversy had erupted after the Pakistani actress had announced the release of her song Qubool last year on August 11.
Soon after the announcement, a clip of them dancing in the mosque started to circulate on social media, triggering a controversy. Pakistan’s Akbari Gate police registered a case against Saba and Bilal on the complaint of lawyer Farhat Manzoor. As per the Islamic law that Pakistan follows, it is strictly prohibited to sing or play music in a mosque.
On court’s orders, FIR had been registered against the actors and the team under sections including “offences relating to religion, injuring or defiling place of worship, with intent to insult the religion of any class, and deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting Its religion or religious beliefs.”
Despite issuing a clarification-cum-apology for shooting a song sequence in the historic Wazir Khan Mosque located in the old city of Lahore, arrest warrants were issued against actress Saba Qamar and singer Bilal Saeed in connection with a case in the month of September.
According to a report in Geo News, the warrants were issued by a judicial magistrate for their failure to appear before the court.
Besides, Pakistan’s Punjab government had also removed two senior officers who allowed the shooting of the song sequence in the mosque.
Saba is also known for the biopic she did on the social media sensation Qandeel Baloch who was murdered by her brother in 2016. She also made headlines when she expressed her grief over checking she had to face while visiting countries like the US and the UK for being a Pakistani.
