Muslim woman who subjected girl, 10, to 45-minute beating with steel ladle for not reading enough of the Koran is jailed

Asia Parveen, 31, inflicted 57 separate injuries during attack

Parveen blamed her hormones and stress from fasting during Ramadan for launching the assault



Police found the young victim wandering the streets in the early morning



Asia Parveen: Caused 57 injuries to the child and later claimed her violent outburst was prompted by hormones

A Muslim woman who repeatedly beat a ten-year-old girl with a steel ladle for not reading enough verses of the Koran was jailed yesterday.

Asia Parveen, who was five months pregnant at the time, left the child with 57 injuries and later claimed her violent outburst was prompted by her hormones.

The girl managed to escape when Parveen ran to her kitchen for a knife, and was found alone at a bus stop in the early hours of the morning.

Parveen, 31, had argued with the girl on August 15 last year, Snaresbrook Crown Court in London heard.

She accused the girl of lying about how many verses of the Koran she had read while praying.

She then hit the girl with the ten- inch ladle for 45 minutes and forced her to stand with her arms outstretched for four hours.

The girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, escaped when Parveen went to fetch a knife which she brandished, saying she was going to kill her.

She was found four hours later, alone and in the cold at the bus stop, by police.

Doctors identified 57 injuries, including marks on her arms, legs, elbows and head, when she was examined at hospital.

Parveen, a former professional traditional dancer who had toured worldwide, had been fasting for the Muslim holy month of Ramadan before the attack.

She was considered to be ‘immoral’ by some in the community in Pakistan for her former dancing career and so wanted the girl to take her religious duties seriously.

Parveen, a mother of three, accepted causing some of the girl’s injuries with the ladle but claimed that others must have happened when the girl ‘fell over’.

Tom Nicholson, prosecuting, said: ‘The girl was praying from the Koran and Mrs Parveen accused her of lying about how many of the verses she had read.

‘She was ten at the time. Mrs Parveen took a metal spoon about ten inches in size and hit the child with it repeatedly, causing extensive bruising over both arms, her legs and head.

‘Mrs Parveen said she was going to kill the girl and ran to get a knife from the kitchen.

‘The girl had no alternative but to leave at around 10pm.’

Jailed: Asia Parveen launched 'a sustained and vicious attack' with a metal ladle

Jailing Parveen, who is now divorced, for nine months, Judge Martyn Zeidman ignored pleas in a letter from the child victim to spare her jail.

He said: ‘You need to understand that this was outrageous behaviour and if you ever attack a child again, you will go to prison for very much longer.



'Of course the injuries itself were not life-threatening but there were so many of them and the pictures and the body plan prepared by the paediatrician demonstrate there were 57 injuries.

‘Having a very young baby should not be seen as a get out of jail card.’



Parveen, who lives in Hackney, East London, admitted a single count of child cruelty after initially insisting she had used the spoon only once or twice on the girl’s arms and bottom.

During further court proceedings, she admitted in a second plea that she had lost her temper after feeling ‘hormonal’, ‘isolated’ and ‘ashamed’.

She claimed the other injuries had been the result of the girl falling over.



She also denied threatening to kill the ten-year-old or picking up a knife.