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Supreme Court acquits Salman in wife’s murder case
ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan has acquitted Salman of murdering his wife, holding that recovery of her body from a shared family house and the absence of a plausible explanation could not replace reliable evidence proving his guilt.
The judgment in Salman v. The State, Jail Petition No. 565 of 2022, was delivered on 2 October 2026 by Justices Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan and Shakeel Ahmad. Justice Khan authored the decision. The supplied judgment is approved for reporting and states no law-report citation.
The Court converted the jail petition into an appeal and allowed it, setting aside the trial court and Sindh High Court decisions against Salman. It directed his immediate release unless he was required to be detained in another case.
Download the complete judgment — PDF, 10 pages, or view the judgment.
Conviction concerned a shooting in Hyderabad
The case arose from FIR No. 68 dated 23 March 2013 at Police Station Qasimabad, Hyderabad, under Sections 302/34 PPC. Salman and his brother Imran were convicted on 7 November 2017 under Sections 302(b)/34 PPC and sentenced to life imprisonment, with compensation of Rs. 200,000 each under Section 544-A Cr.P.C.
On 17 October 2022, the Sindh High Court, Circuit Court at Hyderabad, maintained Salman’s conviction but acquitted Imran on benefit of doubt in Criminal Jail Appeal No. S-275-A of 2017.
The complainant alleged that Salman called him and said he had shot his wife, Mst. Tanvir Akbar alias Ayesha. The Supreme Court examined whether the later witness account, alleged call, recovery, forensic material and motive reliably connected Salman to the murder.
Later-introduced eyewitness was unreliable
No eyewitness was named in the FIR, which the Court noted was lodged four hours after the alleged call. Muhammad Riaz was introduced as an eyewitness later that night. He lived in Mirpur Khas and claimed to be in Hyderabad for shopping, but supplied no adequate details supporting that explanation.
Although related to the complainant, he did not immediately notify him or the police after allegedly witnessing the murder. Instead, he said he returned to Mirpur Khas. The Supreme Court agreed with the High Court’s rejection of his account and regarded him as subsequently planted to strengthen the prosecution case.
The finding concerned his unexplained presence and conduct together with his late introduction. It was not a rule that a relative or a witness visiting another district is automatically unworthy of belief.
Alleged call and forensic evidence did not complete the case
Neither the complainant’s nor Salman’s telephone number appeared in the FIR. No call detail record was produced to establish the alleged call. Once the eyewitness account was rejected, the Court found the remaining circumstantial evidence inadequate.
The pistol and cartridge empties were deposited together at the forensic laboratory. The Court acknowledged that Salman’s arrest and the pistol recovery occurred on the day of the incident, leaving no earlier opportunity to dispatch the empties. Nevertheless, the prosecution did not examine the person who carried the items to the laboratory to establish their safe custody.
Considering those defects and the planted eyewitness account, the Court found it unsafe to rely on the pistol recovery and positive forensic report. It referred to Abdul Wahid v. The State, 2023 SCMR 1278, and Sarfraz v. The State, 2023 SCMR 670. Its reasoning assessed the evidence cumulatively; it did not hold that every joint laboratory dispatch automatically requires acquittal.
Article 122 could not rescue an unreliable prosecution
The State relied on Article 122 of the Qanun-e-Shahadat Order, 1984, arguing that Salman had to explain his wife’s death inside his home. The Supreme Court rejected using that argument to sustain this conviction where reliable prosecution evidence was lacking.
Paragraph 8 explains that Article 122 cannot shift the entire burden to an accused merely because he gives no plausible explanation or because a body is found in his house. The prosecution must first discharge its legal burden through convincing and reliable evidence.
The Court discussed Muhammad Pervaiz v. The State and others, PLD 2019 SC 592; Asad Khan v. The State, PLD 2017 SC 681; Nazeer Ahmed v. The State, 2016 SCMR 1628; and Abdul Majeed v. The State, 2011 SCMR 941. It distinguished the earlier authorities relied upon by the State where an obligation to explain an unnatural death had been considered. The judgment does not abolish Article 122 or declare it irrelevant in every household-death prosecution.
Shared occupancy and unproved motive weakened the inference
Other family members, including Imran, lived in the same house. It was not in Salman’s exclusive possession. The Court therefore rejected treating the location of the body as sufficient proof that only Salman could have committed the murder.
The alleged matrimonial dispute was also vague. The prosecution supplied no specific reason for it and produced no family proceeding or application supporting it. The Court found the asserted motive unproved; it did not hold that a family suit is legally indispensable to proving every matrimonial motive.
Paragraph 9 reiterates that strong suspicion and probabilities cannot substitute for proof. Paragraph 10 records the acquittal on benefit of doubt and the conditional direction for immediate release.
Judgment particulars and sources
- Case: Salman v. The State.
- Court: Supreme Court of Pakistan, Appellate Jurisdiction.
- Proceeding: Jail Petition No. 565 of 2022.
- Decision and hearing date: 2 October 2026.
- Bench: Justices Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan and Shakeel Ahmad.
- Author: Justice Malik Shahzad Ahmad Khan.
- Reporting status: approved for reporting; no reporter citation stated in the supplied PDF.
- Result: petition converted into appeal and allowed; murder conviction set aside; release ordered unless detention is required in another case.
The download reproduces the supplied judgment unchanged. Use the Supreme Court’s official case-information portal with Jail Petition No. 565 of 2022 as an alternative court-record route. The report relies on the supplied judgment; a separate direct court-hosted PDF was not verified.