Pakistan student, 22, sentenced to death while minor gets life term in jail on charges of blasphemy over WhatsApp messages

A court in Pakistan’s Punjab province has sentenced a student to death on the charges of blasphemy over Whatsapp messages, BBC reported on Friday.

The court said the 22-year-old youth was sentenced to death over alleged photos and videos that contained derogatory words about Prophet Muhammad.

Another student, 17, was sentenced to life imprisonment instead of the death penalty because he is a minor, BBC reported.

The action against the student was taken after a complaint was filed in 2022 by the cybercrime unit of Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) in Lahore. The complainant alleged that he had received the videos and photos from three different mobile phone numbers.

The lawyers of the two students, however, have said that they have been “trapped in a false case”, the BBC reported, adding that the father of the death-row convict will file an appeal in the Lahore High Court.