Fact-check: No. Speaker Malik Ahmad Khan was not named in the Kasur child scandal
Khan’s name does not appear in any of the documents related to the crime, such as courts’ judgements, police complaints or even in the news reports from the year or later
Updated Tuesday Mar 05 2024
Online posts are fueling claims that the recently-elected speaker of the Punjab Assembly was named as an accused in the 2015 child sexual abuse scandal reported from Kasur, Punjab.
The claim is unfounded.
Claim
On February 25, a user on X, formerly known as Twitter, uploaded a picture of politician Malik Muhammad Ahmad Khan and wrote: “The man named in the Kasur pornography scandal has been awarded with the post of speaker of the Punjab assembly.”
The post has been viewed over 300,000 times, reposted nearly 9,000 times and liked over 15,000 times on the platform.
Identical text has been posted here, here and here.
Fact
Malik Muhammad Ahmad Khan, the newly-elected speaker of the Punjab Assembly and a senior leader of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), was not named in the paedophile and pornography ring scandal reported from Kasur in 2015.
His name does not appear as an accused or a facilitator in any of the documents related to the crime, such as courts’ verdicts, police complaints or even in the news reports from the year or later.
In fact, Khan is being confused with another parliamentarian from Kasur, Malik Ahmed Saeed, who also belongs to the PML-N.
Saeed was initially named in the scandal for allegedly facilitating the accused. But the politician denied the charges and was never convicted.
Saeed is currently a member of the Punjab Assembly. On February 8, he was elected from PP-178 in Kasur. His picture is available on the Punjab assembly’s website, from where one can see that he and Khan are two separate politicians.
Around 25 first information reports (FIRs) were filed after the Kasur incident, in the Ganda Singhwala police station. All 25 FIRs are available with Geo Fact Check. Speaker Malik Muhammad Ahmad Khan was not nominated in a single FIR.
Khan’s name also does not appear in the verdict announced by the Lahore High Court (LHC) on December 13, 2023.
Furthermore, Geo News had reported on the incident on January 26, 2018. One of the victims at the time had alleged that he received a call from Malik Ahmed Saeed Khan in 2016 who offered him money to drop the case.
However, Saeed had called the allegations “baseless” and “without proof”.
None of the victims and lawyers Geo News spoke to, at that time, had named Malik Muhammad Ahmad Khan, the speaker of the Punjab assembly.
With additional reporting by Nadia Khalid.
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