Aasia Bibi: A Story of Hope, Faith & Endurance

The story of Aasia Bibi, a poor woman, mother of five children and wife of a brick-kiln worker, is a tale full of tragedies. Bibi is a Christian woman of a small, dusty village of Sheikhupura, Pakistan.

An unknown person nine years ago, Aasia Bibi has become an icon all over the world of faith, courage and patience. She was falsely accused of blasphemy for speaking against the Prophet of Islam, manhandled brutally by a religiously charged mob, dragged to the village headman, arrested by police and thrown into a dungeon where she stayed for nine years before the Supreme Court of Pakistan reversed the death sentence awarded by the Trial and High Courts. She was acquitted but was unable to enjoy the freedom because the religious fanatics were and still are after her life. After her freedom from jail, nobody knows her whereabouts. Security agencies have hidden her in an unknown location to protect her and her family from the wild mobs who are trying to hound her. The religiously charged mobs, angry at the Supreme Court verdict, ransacked the country, torching private and state property. They want to kill Bibi to win a noble and honourable place in Heaven. That is what the religious extremists believe. It is said that the judge of the Trial Court in Sheikhupura District disappeared midway during the trial and the judge who wrote her death sentence got standing ovation from the lawyers community and public. The High Court judges were scared to change Bibi’s death sentence because they received death threats including threats to their families’ lives.

Aasia Bibi has narrated the story of her arrest in very painful words in her book, ‘Blasphemy: Sentenced to Death over a Cup of Water’. She says:

“The angry crowd is pressing closer and closer around me. I’m half lying on the ground when two men grab me by the arms to drag me away. I call out in a desperate, feeble voice:

“I haven’t done anything! Let me go, please! I haven’t done anything wrong!”

Just then someone hits me in the face. My nose really hurts and I’m bleeding. They drag me along, semi-conscious, like a stubborn donkey. I can only submit and pray that it will all stop soon. I look at the crowd, apparently jubilant that I’ve put up so little resistance. I stagger as the blows rain down on my legs, my back and the back of my head. I tell myself that when we get to the village perhaps my sufferings will be over. But when we arrive there it’s worse: there are even more people and the crowd turn more and more aggressive, calling all the louder for my death.

More and more people join the crowd as they push me towards the home of the village headman. I recognize the house — it’s the only one that has a garden with grass growing in it. They throw me to the ground. The village imam speaks to me: “I’ve been told you’ve insulted our Prophet. You know what happens to anyone who attacks the holy Prophet Mohammed. You can redeem yourself only by conversion or death.”

“I haven’t done anything! Please! I beg you! I’ve done nothing wrong!”

The qari with his long, well-combed beard, turns to Musarat and the three women who were there on the day of the falsa harvest.

“Did she speak ill of Muslims and our holy Prophet Mohammed?”

“Yes, she insulted them,” replies Musarat, and the others join in:

“It’s true, she insulted our religion.”

“If you don’t want to die,” says the young mullah, “you must convert to Islam. Are you willing to redeem yourself by becoming a good Muslim?”

Sobbing, I reply:

“No, I don’t want to change my religion. But please believe me, I didn’t do what these women say, I didn’t insult your religion. Please have mercy on me.”

I put my hands together and plead with him. But he is unmoved.

“You’re lying! Everyone says you committed this blasphemy and that’s proof enough. Christians must comply with the law of Pakistan, which forbids any derogatory remarks about the holy Prophet. Since you won’t convert, and the Prophet cannot defend himself, we shall avenge him.”

He turns on his heel and the angry crowd falls on me. I’m beaten with sticks and spat at. I think I’m going to die. Then they ask me again:

“Will you convert to a religion worthy of the name?”

“No, please, I’m a Christian, but I beg you . . .”

And they go on beating me with the same fury as before.

I was barely conscious and could hardly feel the pain of my wounds by the time the police arrived. Two policemen threw me in their van, to cheers from the angry crowd, and a few minutes later I was in the police station in Nankana Sahib.

In the police chief’s office, they sat me down on a bench. I asked for water and compresses for the wounds on my legs, which were streaming with blood. A young policeman threw me an old dishcloth and spat out at me:

“Here, and don’t get it everywhere.”

One of my arms really hurt and I thought it might be broken. Just then I saw the qari come in with Musarat and her gang. With me sitting there they told the police chief that I insulted the Prophet Mohammed. From outside the police station I could hear shouts:

“Death to the Christian!”

After writing up the report the policeman turned and called to me in a nasty voice:

“So, what have you got to say for yourself?”

“I’m innocent! It’s not true! I didn’t insult the Prophet!”

Immediately after I’d protested my innocence I was manhandled into the police van and driven away. During the journey I passed out from pain and only came back to myself as we were arriving at Sheikhupura prison, where I was thrown into a cell.

Since that day I haven’t left prison”. (From Aasia’s book, Blasphemy: Sentenced to Death over a Cup of Water)

The poor woman remained in a small, little dungeon, called in prison terms the Death Cell, for eight long years. The dark and dingy room was so small that she could touch both side-walls with outstretched arms. The inbuilt toilet was always filthy because the cleaner would not visit her cell regularly. The room was full of the stench of urine to the extent that the olfactory sense refused to adapt to it. The roof of the cell leaked in the rainy season with muddy water dripping on the poorly equipped bed she was provided with. The blanket and the mattress would always get soaked during rains. She could not sleep but sit in a corner to protect herself from the rain water dripping down the roof. There was no fan to cool the scorching temperatures during summers and no heating to warm the room in freezing winters.

“The prison is squalid, no window. The lavatory is an open sewer in her cell. Every so often it has to be cleaned out, but she lives with the stink. Her only rest area is a rope bed. The floor’s wet most of the time. She has nowhere to dry her clothes after washing them, so she puts them on to dry”. Review published on Amazon.com November 6, 2018

Bibi remained in that deadly death cell for eight long years, absolutely cut off from the rest of the world. No one, except her husband, Ashiq, could visit her once a week. The attitude of the prison staff, as is the case in all prisons, was very inhumane and merciless.

Notwithstanding all the threats to her life Aasia Bibi remained firm in her faith. She says in her book:

“I’m the victim of a cruel, collective injustice.

I’ve been locked up, handcuffed and chained, banished from the world and waiting to die. I don’t know how long I’ve got left to live. Every time my cell door opens my heart beats faster. My life is in God’s hands and I don’t know what’s going to happen to me. It’s a brutal, cruel existence. But I am innocent. I’m guilty only of being presumed guilty. I’m starting to wonder whether being a Christian in Pakistan today is not just a failing, or a mark against you, but actually a crime.

But though I’m kept in a tiny, windowless cell, I want my voice and my anger to be heard. I want the whole world to know that I’m going to be hanged for helping my neighbor. I’m guilty of having shown someone sympathy. What did I do wrong? I drank water from a well belonging to Muslim women, using “their” cup, in the burning heat of the midday sun.

I, Asia Bibi, have been sentenced to death because I was thirsty. I’m a prisoner because I used the same cup as those Muslim women, because water served by a Christian woman was regarded as unclean by my stupid fellow fruit-pickers.

That day, June 14, 2009, is imprinted on my memory. I can still see every detail”.

(New York Post August 25, 2013)

Aasia Bibi never lost her hope to be a free person one day, to celebrate her life together with her family. Her hope, faith and patience culminated in the realization of her dream and vision. She finally got her freedom.  Aasia’s story is a living testimony providing evidence that ‘faith moves mountains’. The day is not far when she will be walking as a free person somewhere in this world among the people who believe in human rights and justice.

Courtesy: Charismatic Social Integration of Canada (CSIOC), December 8, 2018

Mumtaz Shah