A young Pakistani couple committed suicide after their parents forbade them from tying the knot.
The real life Romeo and Juliet — identified only as Adnan and Muqaddas — were found in critical condition at a home in the district of Faisalabad on Sunday.
According to Vice, the pair was rushed to a hospital where they were both pronounced dead. They had purportedly “ingested poison” together.
The publication claims Muqaddas’ family had arranged for her to marry another man, with the wedding ceremony set to take place on the same day she ended her life.
Arranged marriages are commonplace in Pakistan, with a 2019 Gallup survey finding 85% of people across the country had their families find their spouse.
Muqaddas’ parents reportedly rejected her requests to be with Adnan, causing her extreme distress.
Muqaddas and Adnan aren’t the only star-crossed lovers in Pakistan who have died by suicide after their families forbade them from being together.
The tragedy resembles the plot of William Shakespeare’s “Romeo & Juliet.” A still from the 1996 film adaptation is pictured. FoxAnother couple killed themselves after ingesting poison in 2016, Vice reported.
And in 2017, two distressed lovers jumped in front of a train after their romance faced widespread disapproval.
That same year, The Post reported that a Pakistani woman who had tried to flee her arranged marriage killed her husband and 12 of his relatives using poisoned milk.
The woman, then-21-year-old Aasia Bibi, carried out the act less than two months after tying the knot. Straight after the wedding ceremony, she tried to return to her parents, only to be sent back to her husband.
She was subsequently sentenced to life in prison.
