MARDAN: The Mardan lynching victim months ago had reported a fake Facebook account being operated under his name by someone apparently to blackmail him, it has been learnt.

Mashal Khan, a university student, who was lynched to death by an angry mob on Thursday on blasphemy charges in one of his Facebook posts in December last, had said whoever was operating his fake account was trying to blackmail him.

He also expressed his fears on Twitter that this might be an attempt to defame him.

The young 23-year-old student, in an interview with a local TV, had spoken against the university administration on mismanagement at the campus soon after which an inquiry was initialed against Mashal and two other students on blasphemy charges.

On his personal Facebook profile, Mashal had shown his love and respect for the Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). Surprisingly, a sacrilegious post was uploaded from a another account under his name the same day he was brutally killed but was removed later, meaning Mashal was not operating that account.

The probe is underway but the initial investigations into the incident have not found anything suspicious linking him with the blasphemous social media accounts.