A feminine police officer has been honoured for safeguarding a lady from a mob accusing her of blasphemy in Pakistan.
The girl was in a Lahore restaurant when folks outdoors took offence to the Arabic script on her costume.
The phrase printed on the costume was “halwa”, which suggests “beautiful” in Arabic, however the crowd mistook it for verses from the Koran, the Muslim holy e book.
Video footage exhibits them shouting for her to take the garment off, with some chanting that these responsible of blasphemy ought to be beheaded.
Blasphemy is punishable by dying in Pakistan, the place some folks have been lynched even earlier than their instances go to trial.
Police officer Syeda Shehrbano, an assistant superintendent in Lahore, stepped in and pleaded with the offended mob to “trust us”.
She coated the lady in a black gown and gold scarf earlier than pushing by the gang, guiding her to security.
Usman Anwar, police inspector normal of Punjab province, mentioned Shehrbano had “put her life in danger” to rescue the lady.
In a ceremony in Rawalpindi, she was awarded Pakistan’s highest honour in regulation enforcement from the nation’s navy, which referred to as her “fearless”.
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She advised German information outlet DW: “The first response we had when we looked at the scenario was that we have to disperse the crowd enough to make way for ourselves, enough to ensure that the stove which is burning right in front of the shop is not used as material to cause or set fire to the shop.
“And the third is to get the lady out as quickly as potential.”
She said the woman had refused to remove her clothing, despite the demands of the crowd.
“She was sturdy sufficient to state they weren’t gods on earth and so they gathered a mob round her to pursue her or to power her to vary her clothes.
“They have rendered this woman in a very traumatic state of mind that she’ll be fighting probably for the rest of her life.”
After the lady was rescued from the gang, she was moved to a police station.
Local students and clerics have been introduced in, together with some who had been within the offended crowd.
They examined the calligraphy on the lady’s costume and concluded it didn’t comprise any Koranic verses.
Source: information.sky.com”