Murdered By My Father

Kiran Sonia Sawar stars as Salma, a 17 year old girl who is the victim of a so-called "honour" killing at the hands of her father in a new BBC Three factual-based drama Murdered By My Father, due to air online later this month.

Murdered By My Father follows the renowned success of BBC Three’s bold dramas based on real-life testimonies, including the critically acclaimed, BAFTA-award-winning Murdered By My Boyfriend and also Don’t Take My Baby.

Inspired by real events, Murdered By My Father is directed by multi-award-winning director Bruce Goodison and written by new screenwriter Vinay Patel, and tells the shocking story of how family love and duty can be turned to violence and murder.

Kiran Sonia Sawar (represented by Polly's Agency) is a graduate of Oxford School of Drama and has previously appeared in American crime series Legends and the BBC’s Holby City.

Salma’s love interest, Imi, is played by Mawaan Rizwan (represented by PBJ Management) who is known for his YouTube comedy channel Malum TV, his role in CBBC’s comedy show DNN and most recently for fronting BBC Three’s documentary How Gay Is Pakistan?

Other young members of the cast include Salman Akhtar as Haroon and Ambreen Razia as Rafia.

Adeel Akhtar, who plays Salma's father Shahzad, is known for his performances in films Four Lions and The Dictator, and more recently in BBC dramas River, Capital and The Night Manager, as well as his BAFTA-nominated performance in Channel 4’s Utopia.

Executive producer, Aysha Rafaele, says: “We felt so excited to be working with our young cast and writer, the wonderful Vinay Patel, and to be part of BBC Three’s great story of breaking new creative talent.”

Focusing on the bonds of love and grief uniting a daughter with her widower father, as well as his need to control her burgeoning teenage wish for freedom, the young screenwriter Vinay Patel examines the psychology of this shocking but surprisingly prevalent crime. ‘Honour’ killings continue to occur across various cultures and communities in the UK today – with 12,000 'honour-based' crimes reported in the UK since 2010 and 29 murders committed in the past five years.

The 75-minute drama will be available online from late-March 2016 (date to be confirmed).