Sabiha Baloch, a prominent leader of the Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC), has issued a strong statement condemning the alleged desecration of bodies of those killed during recent clashes in Turbat, Balochistan.
According to Baloch, Pakistani security forces not only withheld the bodies of the deceased for weeks but later buried them without shrouds and in an un-Islamic manner, a move she termed a blatant violation of human, moral, and Islamic principles.
“The Pakistani state repeatedly tries to associate us with armed movements just because we advocate for the simple demand that families should be given the right to bury their dead in accordance with Islamic teachings. Is that demand illegal or unethical?” she asked.
Highlighting what she described as inhumane treatment, Baloch said that families in Turbat staged days-long protests demanding the return of their loved ones’ bodies. Once the location of the graves was discovered, women themselves began digging, only to find the bodies buried without proper burial rites. When they attempted to re-bury them respectfully, police intervened and re-sealed the graves.
Sabiha Baloch further questioned, “If Pakistan claims to be an Islamic society, then is it in accordance with Islamic principles to take revenge on the dead, to deny them burial shrouds, and to prevent families from performing last rites? Does Sharia apply only to the public and not to state institutions?”
She appealed to religious scholars to take a firm stand against what she described as desecration, vengeance, and denial of basic religious rights to the bereaved families. “This is not only inhumane and unethical, but clearly un-Islamic,” she asserted.
The BYC leader concluded that respect for the dead is a core value in all civilized societies. “Any state that fails to uphold this cannot claim to be either Islamic or humane.”