A 49-year-old blind Christian in Pakistan has been arrested and charged with blasphemy, punishable by death, after a Muslim accused him of insulting Islam’s prophet, his mother said.
Martha Yousaf, the nearly 80-year-old mother of Nadeem Masih, said that Waqas Mazhar and other Muslims often harassed her son, sometimes extorting money from him and other times throwing water on him or calling him names.
Mazhar works in the Model Town Park in Lahore as a parking contractor, where Masih also earned a meager income providing a weighing scale for petty merchants.
“Sometimes kindhearted visitors would also give him more money due to his disability, but the park’s Muslim workers used to steal it from his pocket,” said Yousaf, a Catholic resident of Chak No. 9/4L village in Okara District, Punjab Province. “Some, including Mazhar, had also taken loans of various amounts from him but refused to return the money despite his repeated requests.”
When Masih went to work on Aug. 21, Mazhar and the others refused to let him set up his makeshift stall, Yousaf said.
“When Masih protested against their harassment, Mazhar and another man manhandled him and forced him to sit on a motorcycle and took him to the Model Town Police Station,” she said.
There they accused him of blasphemy and handed him to police, who booked him under Section 295-C of the harsh laws, which calls for the death sentence for insulting Muhammad.
“When I met my son for the first time in jail after his arrest, he cried bitterly as he told me how the police had mercilessly beaten him and forced him to admit to the false charge,” Yousaf told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News.
The police’s treatment of her son has been cruel from the onset, she said.
“Every time I meet him, my heart bleeds and cries when he tells me how badly he is being treated, especially when he’s taken for court appearances,” she said. “They push him around despite knowing that he is completely blind and also has an iron rod in his right leg.”
Pleading for her son’s release from a false charge, Yousaf said she had already lost one son some years ago, leaving only Masih and her three daughters to provide for the family.
“We are very poor people and barely manage to meet both ends. Masih’s father has passed away, and now one of my daughters, who is divorced and is living with me, works in people’s homes to help us both sustain,” she said, sobbing. “Every day I pray to God to deliver my son from this false accusation and bring him back to me.”
Despite his disability and financial constraints, Masih completed his graduation but was unable to find a job as there were hardly any employment opportunities in Pakistan for people with disabilities, she said.
Masih’s attorney, Javed Sahotra, said there were major discrepancies in the First Information Report (FIR) that would enable him to get bail for the Christian. The complainant in the case, Police Sub-Inspector Muhammad Ayub, claimed he and his team were patrolling the park at 11 p.m. when they were informed about the alleged blasphemy.
“However, the fact is that the park’s gates close at 9 p.m., and no one is allowed inside after that,” Sahotra told Christian Daily International-Morning Star News. “Moreover, Masih had made a call on the police helpline at 6 a.m. to inform them about his mistreatment by the parking contractor and others but received no help.”
Sahotra has filed an application to the office of the Model Town police superintendent to provide him with the call data record of the sub-inspector, which would show Ayub’s location at the time of the alleged crime, he said.
“In case the trial court does not grant bail to Masih, we will move the Lahore High Court, which will surely take these facts into consideration,” he added.
Sahotra confirmed Masih’s claim that he was tortured by police while in custody.
“It is very unfortunate that a blind person was subjected to such inhumane treatment by the police,” he said. “We hope that the government and the senior police officials will take notice of this high-handed behavior by their personnel and take disciplinary action against them.”
Naeem Yousaf, executive director of the Catholic Church’s legal advocacy group, the National Commission for Justice and Peace (NCJP), condemned the unjust arrest of a blind man on a charge as serious as blasphemy.
“Masih kept going all these years despite being a target of harsh social attitudes that fail to recognize disabled people as human beings,” he said. “Already burdened by poverty, blindness and social cruelty, he is now suffering even more behind the bars of a jail cell, a victim of injustice and human indifference.”
Pakistan’s blasphemy laws have been systematically misused to target religious minorities, dispossess the poor and settle personal and economic disputes, Human Rights Watch stated in a June 9 report.
“Blasphemy accusations are increasingly weaponized to incite mob violence, displace vulnerable communities and seize their property with impunity,” states the 29-page report, “A Conspiracy to Grab the Land: Exploiting Pakistan’s Blasphemy Laws for Blackmail and Profit.”
In several cases, blasphemy accusations were used to target business rivals or coerce property transfers, according to the report. It added that the law’s broad and vague provisions allow it to be exploited with minimal or no evidence, creating a climate of fear among vulnerable groups.
HRW criticized Pakistan’s criminal justice system for enabling these abuses. Authorities rarely hold perpetrators of mob violence accountable, while police often fail to protect the accused or investigate allegations, it stated.
In some instances, officers who intervene face threats themselves. Political and religious actors accused of inciting violence frequently escape arrest or are acquitted due to lack of political will or intimidation.
Pakistan ranked eighth on Open Doors’ 2025 World Watch List of the 50 countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian.
