 Following this Bhutto and his leftist colleagues were dragged into a two-year-long political trial in the Supreme Court.Bhutto was executed in 1979 after being convicted of authorising the murder of a political opponent in a controversial 4–3 split decision by the Supreme Court.This period of military rule, lasting from 1977 to 1988, is often regarded as a period of persecution and the growth of state-sponsored religious conservatism.