Maulana Ayubi lands in trouble after nikah with teenager

PESHAWAR: Balochistan MNA Maulana Salahuddin Ayubi’s nikah with a teenager from Chitral has landed him in trouble as it is being opposed by civil society members and widely reported in sections of the media.

The civil society activists from Chitral had objected to the marriage and filed a report with the police that the girl was 14 years old when her nikah to the much older Ayubi, the JUI-F MNA in his 50s from Chaman in Qilla Abdullah district, was performed. Later, the issue was taken up by the civil society organizations in rest of Pakistan, demanding a probe. The issue was also raised in the National Assembly.

According to new details, the Nadra issued the girl a CNIC showing her age as 18 years on February 15, the day her nikah was performed with Ayubi in Peshawar. The nikah wasn’t performed in Chitral as was being mentioned earlier. It means she was brought to Peshawar for the nikah and also for obtaining the national identity card.

Ironically, the District Police Officer (DPO) for Lower Chitral district to which the girl belongs is a woman, Sonia Shamroz Khan. In fact, she is the only women DPO in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Sonia Shamroz was quoted as saying that the girl’s father had given an assurance in writing that he will ask the police before arranging a proper marriage ceremony. Earlier the father, whose family belongs to Jughoor in Drosh tehsil, had said that the girl had consented to the nikah.

It isn’t the first time that a young girl from Chitral was married to an older man. The poor Chitrali families give away the hand of their daughters to people outside Chitral in the hope that they would live a better life. Many men from not only Khyber Pakhtunkhwa but also other provinces strive to get married to the fair-skinned Chitrali girls. The Chitralis are generally known as docile and law-abiding. In recent years, the civil society activists, particularly the lawyers, from Chitral have started monitoring such marriages and highlighting the issue through the media and by reporting it to the police. In this case, the most visible role is being played by the Anjuman-e-Haqooq-e-Chitral which claims to be struggling for the rights of Chitrali people.

Ayubi had become known after winning the National Assembly seat, NA-263 Qilla Abdullah, in the July 2018 general election by defeating Mahmood Khan Achakzai, the head of the Pashtun Khwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP). Ayub polled 37,971 votes while Achakzai secured 19,989. In fact, the runner-up in the contest was Asghar Khan Achakzai of the Awami National Party (ANP), who got 21,417 votes.