Pakistan court indicts actress Saba Qamar for shooting music video at mosque

Pakistani actress Saba Qamar and singer Bilal Saeed were indicted on Wednesday on charges of alleged desecration of the Wazeer Khan mosque last year. The duo had shot a music video at the mosque. 

Qubool, the music video starring Saba Qamar and Bilal Saeed was released in 2020. It is a song written, composed, and produced by Bilal Saeed. The track is a catchy contemporary Punjabi love song that reflects misunderstandings that often blur love’s path, making room for rigidity and doubt.  

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Both of them received hateful and offensive comments on social media for disrespecting the place of worship. Saeed apologised to his fans, assuring them that only a nikkah sequence was shot inside the mosque without any dance or dance music.

Qamar reacted to the criticism in a series of tweets: “It was the music video featuring a Nikaah (marriage) scene. It was neither shot with any sort of playback music nor has it been edited to the music track.” 

Last year, Lahore police had registered a case against Qamar and Saeed under section 295 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) for allegedly ‘desecration’ of Masjid Wazir Khan in the old city of Lahore.

According to reports in TV news channels, Lahore’s magisterial court has issued a bailable warrant against Saba Qamar and Bilal Saeed for avoiding the court hearings. The Lahore court adjourned the hearing till October 6, and both the suspects pleaded before the court ‘not guilty.’ The duo said that they would contest the trial. The magistrate directed the prosecution to present its witnesses next hearing on October 14.

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Different religious parties, including Jamaat-i-Islami, have also held demonstrations in the city demanding the ‘strict punishment’ for what they call committing ‘sin.’

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