The Kasur child sexual abuse scandal is a series of

child sexual abuse Child sexual abuse (CSA), also called child molestation, is a form of child abuse in which an adult or older adolescent uses a child for sexual stimulation. Forms of child sexual abuse include engaging in sexual activities with a child (whet ...

s that occurred in Hussain Khanwala village in Kasur District,

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising a ...

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 243 million people, and has the world's second-lar ...

from 2006 to 2014, culminating in a major

political scandal In politics, a political scandal is an action or event regarded as morally or legally wrong and causing general public outrage. Politicians, government officials, party officials and lobbyists can be accused of various illegal, corrupt, uneth ...

in 2015. After the discovery of hundreds of

video clips Video clips refer to mostly short videos, most of the time called memes, which are short videos of silly jokes and funny clips, most of the time coming from movies or any entertainment videos such as YouTube. The term is also used more loosely to ...

showing children performing forced sex acts, various Pakistani media organizations estimated that 280 to 300 children, most of them male, were victims of sexual abuse. The scandal involved an

organized crime Organized crime (or organised crime) is a category of transnational, national, or local groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally th ...

ring that sold

child pornography Child pornography (also called CP, child sexual abuse material, CSAM, child porn, or kiddie porn) is pornography that unlawfully exploits children for sexual stimulation. It may be produced with the direct involvement or sexual assault of a ...

to porn sites, and blackmailed and

extorted Extortion is the practice of obtaining benefit through coercion. In most jurisdictions it is likely to constitute a criminal offence; the bulk of this article deals with such cases. Robbery is the simplest and most common form of extortion, ...

relatives of the victims. The scandal caused nationwide outrage, among allegations that the Punjab police and Malik Ahmad Saeed Khan, Kasur's

Member of the Provincial Assembly A Member of the Provincial Assembly, or MPA is a representative elected by the voters of an electoral district to the legislature or legislative assembly of a subnational jurisdiction. In Pakistan, the members are elected by the voters in prov ...

from the ruling

Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) The Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) ( ur, , translit=Pākistān Muslim Līg (Nūn) PML(N) or PML-N) is a centre-right and liberal conservative political party in Pakistan. Alongside the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Peoples Par ...

, were involved in an attempted cover-up of the abuse. It is cited by both

news agencies A news agency is an organization that gathers news reports and sells them to subscribing news organizations, such as newspapers, magazines and radio and television broadcasters. A news agency may also be referred to as a wire service, newswire, ...

and

government departments Ministry or department (also less commonly used secretariat, office, or directorate) are designations used by first-level executive bodies in the machinery of governments that manage a specific sector of public administration." Энцикло� ...

as the largest child abuse scandal in Pakistan's history. Besides large-scale public condemnation, 50 Pakistani clergy and religious scholars issued a fatwa (religious decree) for capital punishment of the culprits, and demanded that the government console the victims and their parents.

Abuse

Ashraf Javed, a staff reporter for ''The Nation'', broke the news that a gang of 20 to 25 men had allegedly filmed up to 400 videos of

, involving at least 280 children of Hussain Khanwala village in

Kasur Kasur (Urdu and pa, ; also romanized as Qasūr; from pluralized Arabic word ''Qasr'' meaning "palaces" or "forts") is a city to south of Lahore, in the Pakistani province of Punjab. The city serves as the headquarters of Kasur District. Kasu ...

. In one instance, the father of one of the victims was blackmailed into paying PKR 1.2 million to the abusers, who had threatened to release a video of his son being raped.

Police involvement

Clash between police and protesters

On 8 August 2015, villagers from Hussain Khanwala and adjacent villages clashed with policemen in Dolaywala village along Deepalpur Road, after protesting the police's failure to stop the abuse ring. Police cordoned off the roads leading to the village to stop the protesters; As a police contingent tried to halt the mob led by Mobeen Ahmed, the latter pelted stones. Police

teargas Tear gas, also known as a lachrymator agent or lachrymator (), sometimes colloquially known as "mace" after the early commercial aerosol, is a chemical weapon that stimulates the nerves of the lacrimal gland in the eye to produce tears. In ad ...

sed and

baton charge A baton charge is a coordinated tactic for dispersing crowds of people, usually used by police or military in response to public disorder. In South Asia, a long bamboo stick, called ''lathi'' in Hindi, is used for crowd control, and the expres ...

d the crowd, which then damaged official vehicles on Deepalpur Road. DSPs Hassan Farooq Ghumman and Arif Rasheed; Ganda Singh SHO Akmal Kausar; policemen Akbar, Sajid, Riaz, Naeem, Ahmed Ali, Akbar Ghani and Muhammad Akmal; and 15 protesters were injured in the clash.

Government reaction

Rana Sanaullah controversy

The Government of Punjab's initial statement came from Punjab Minister of Law

Rana Sanaullah Rana Sanaullah Khan (Punjabi, ur, born 1 January 1955) is a Pakistani politician serving as the 39th Interior Minister of Pakistan. He has been a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan since August 2018. He is a senior member of PML-N an ...

on 8 August 2015, who stated that a government inquiry committee concluded that no instance of child sex abuse had been reported. Sanaullah said that "reports to this effect surfaced after two parties involved in a

land dispute A territorial dispute or boundary dispute is a disagreement over the possession or control of land between two or more political entities. Context and definitions Territorial disputes are often related to the possession of natural resources s ...

registered 'fake cases' against each other."

Chief Minister's reaction

On 9 August 2015, the Chief Minister of Punjab

Shehbaz Sharif Mian Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif (Urdu, Punjabi: , ; born 23 September 1951) is a Pakistani politician and businessman who is currently serving as the 23rd Prime Minister of Pakistan, in office since 11 April 2022. He is the current president of ...

ordered the Punjab Home Department to request Chief Justice of the

Lahore High Court The Lahore High Court () is based in Lahore, Pakistan. It was established as a high court on 21 March 1882. The Lahore High Court has jurisdiction over Punjab (Pakistan). The High Court's principal seat is in Lahore, but there are benches in th ...

Manzoor Ahmed Malik to constitute a

judicial inquiry A tribunal of inquiry is an official review of events or actions ordered by a government body. In many common law countries, such as the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and Canada, such a public inquiry differs from a royal commission in that ...

into the sex abuse case. On the next day, the Chief Justice rejected the request, observing that the Punjab police was already investigating the case hence there was no need of a separate judicial commission.

References

{{reflist, colwidth=30em 2015 crimes in Pakistan 2015 in Punjab, Pakistan 2015 scandals 2000s crimes in Punjab, Pakistan 2010s crimes in Punjab, Pakistan Child sexual abuse in Pakistan Child pornography Incidents of violence against boys child sexual abuse scandal Pakistani commissions and inquiries Pakistani pornography Rape in Pakistan Rape in the 2000s Rape in the 2010s Scandals in Pakistan Sexual abuse cover-ups Violence against children