The Circumstances Where the Quantum of Punishment Prescribed by Islam for Certain Crimes Can Be Reduced or Enhanced

The crime of theft if committed in unavoidable circumstances like extreme hunger or famine, Hadd punishment shall remain suspended. A crime of Zina if committed in a situation where the life of a woman is in danger because of hunger or thirst and she committed Zina to acquire food items or drinking water to save her life, she will be exonerated from the charges of Zina. In the light of Quranic injunctions, the punishment of a slave girl, if she committed Zina, is half as compare to independent women and the punishment for the wives of the Holy Prophet for committing the crime of fawahish or disobedience (Nushuz), is double as compare to other women. 4. Contrary to this principle, if a respectable person committed crimes under Tazir, he deserves lesser punishment or mere admonition in the light of tradition of the Holy Prophet: (Pardon the wrong done by the nobles of the society”.5. For awarding the punishment of Rajm, if the condition of Ihsan is fulfilled, he/she will be killed by stoning. According to Shiah Imamiah, Allama Rasheed Raza and others, when a person who is once married but due to divorce or separation, is living alone or miles away from his wife and not in a position to enjoy her company. If such person committed Zin┐, he or she will not be awarded the punishment of stoning.6. In the light of tradition, it is not allowed to award death punishment except the following three circumstances. Firstly, if a person, being a Mohsan, committed Zina, . Secondly, after accepting Islam, if a person converted to other religion. Thirdly, death punishment can be awarded in retaliation of murder committed

Bioactive Potential of Fungus Induced Silybum Marianum Seedlings and Isolation of Antimicrobial Genes.

Living organisms are equipped with sophisticated mechanisms to minimize the hazards and threats offered by the nature and maximize their survival potential against strain imposed by environmental forces. Growing concern about the frequent use of analogous antibiotics leading to resistant pathogens and their harmful impacts on crop yield worldwide has fuelled an explosion in the field of plant defense response by coupling biotechnology to the medicinal plants. Increasing knowledge of the mechanisms underlying plant defense response has also encouraged the idea that sensitizing a plant towards microbial elicitors increases plant resistance to the potential pathogens. Considering the same thought of knowledge, this study was entailed to examine the bioactive potential of Silybum marianum under control and fungal stress. Peptide based multidimensional studied of the plant with reference to antimicrobial, antioxidant, antitumor, cytotoxic and mutagenic potential were undertaken. A time course study of the extracts prepared under fungal stress strongly revealed the increased accumulation of proteins/peptides upto 8 hours post inoculation with a drop in the expression level at subsequent hours. Encouraging results regarding antibacterial potential towards gram negative species and highly significant antifungal potential were also observed. In addition to antimicrobial potential, plant also showed beneficial traits as antitumor and nonmutagenic against Agrobacterium tumefaciens and human cell lines respectively. As far as antioxidant and cytotoxic potential is concerned, all the extracts had excellent antioxidant capacity whereas among all, 8 h control and its treated time points showed slight cytotoxicity. Rewarding bioactive potential of Silybum marianum eventually led to the identification of peptides involved in cellular metabolism, plant growth and development, signal transduction and exclusively to the peptides involved in defense response. Antimicrobial gene isolation with subsequent cloning and heterologous expression has proved substantial pharmaceutical importance of the plant which may open novel avenues for biotechnological applications in agriculture.