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                        <title>The Express Tribune</title>
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                        <description>The Express Tribune keeps you up to date with all the latest happenings from Pakistan and across the world!</description>
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			<title>Sidelining marginalised groups</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/989749/sidelining-marginalised-groups</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/989749/sidelining-marginalised-groups#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Thu, 12 Nov 15 00:43:12 +0500</pubDate>
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				<![CDATA[rana.tanveer]]>
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			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
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				<![CDATA[Now the ECP has abolished Form 8 and included its wording for non-Muslims in Form 2]]>
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				<![CDATA[Looking at the various moves of the government and the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), it would appear that Ahmadis are being systematically alienated from the country’s democratic system. Ahmadis, who have remained distant from elections since 1977, do not occupy a single assembly seat specified for minorities.

In 1985, General Ziaul Haq introduced the system of separate electorates and voter lists were prepared on the basis of religion, with there being a separate list for every religion. If one wanted to be listed as a Muslim voter, they had to sign a certificate repudiating the founding of Ahmadiyat. This system continued until the rule of General (retd) Pervez Musharraf, who announced the restoration of joint electorates in May 2002. He, however, could not stand by this and on June 17, 2002, had to issue the Chief Executive’s Order No 15, to create a separate ‘supplementary list of voters’ in which Ahmadi voters were categorised as ‘non-Muslim’. It is still in effect.

In the 2002 elections, the ECP introduced two separate forms for registration of voters; one for Muslims (Form 2) and another for Non-Muslims (Form 8). It was made obligatory for Ahmadis to apply using Form 8. The result was that no Ahmadi registered as a voter because they do not accept that they are non-Muslims. Now the ECP has abolished Form 8 and included its wording for non-Muslims in Form 2. This form also includes a warning that providing inaccurate information about religion will be punishable.

On January 17, 2007, the ECP in its letter No F1(6)/2001-Cord ordered “separate supplementary lists of draft electoral rolls for Ahmadis/Qadianis be published”. Ahmadis do not want to avail the right to vote after having been officially categorised by the state as non-Muslims.

Although the chief election commissioner referred to data from NADRA and registered all Ahmadis as voters, they maintain that they do not want to avail this concession at the cost of their faith.

Although the recent local government elections were held on the basis of joint electorate, they are not joint in true spirit. The electorates remain separate, particularly for Ahmadis. These procedures predictably have resulted in disassociation of the Ahmadi community from elections. As such, for decades now, no Ahmadi has been a member of any assembly, be it national, provincial or even district level. Ahmadis have no representation in the town council of even Chenab Nagar (Rabwah), their own town and headquarters. No representative of theirs has contested the local government elections held across the country.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 12th, 2015.

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			<title>Senate wants assault on Christian student investigated</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/989752/rights-of-minorities-senate-wants-assault-on-christian-student-investigated</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/989752/rights-of-minorities-senate-wants-assault-on-christian-student-investigated#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 11 Nov 15 23:12:13 +0500</pubDate>
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				<![CDATA[qamar.zaman]]>
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			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
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			<description>
				<![CDATA[PM to represent Pakistan at Paris climate change summit]]>
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				<![CDATA[As Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif told members of the Hindu community in Karachi that rights of minorities would be protected at all costs, his leader of the house in Senate on Wednesday sought more information on the Christian girl who had been beaten up for using the washroom.

Leader of the House in Senate Raja Zafarul Haq detailed how the girl was beaten up at a government school in Chak 228-GB during a brawl between three students. He refuted reports that the headmistress of the school was also involved in the incident.

Christian student beaten up for using washroom in Faisalabad

On Tuesday the opposition had staged a walkout on reports of the girl allegedly being beaten up for using a washroom used by Muslim students. The walkout had prompted the Senate chairman to seek a report on the incident.



Haq, who was narrating information provided by the Punjab government, said he too was dissatisfied by the government report and requested that a team from the education department be sent to the school in question to investigate the matter.

Nawaz to attend Paris moot

There was clamour in the upper house on Wednesday over the government’s apathy on charting out a climate change plan.

PPP accused the government for its indifference to climate change and for not announcing policy in this regard. The opposition party asked why the government had failed to submit a 10 year plan on climate change to the UN ahead of Paris Conference on Climate Change.

SC committee for minority rights yet to make a difference

PPP Senator Sherry Rehman lamented how Pakistan had missed two deadlines to submit the Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDC) – the 10-year plan for reduction in carbon emissions – to UN and for the Green Climate Fund ahead of COP 21 (Paris Conference).

In response, Federal Minister for Inter-Provincial Coordination Riaz Hussain Pirzada said that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif would be representing Pakistan at the climate change summit. “PM is himself going to Paris to participate in the conference.”

The government’s policy on climate change, Pirzada said will not compromise on development projects, adding that any losses suffered due to climate changes would be compensated.

‘Change in social behaviour must to protect minorities’

SDG implementation

Senate Chairman Mian Raza Rabbani on Wednesday formed a special committee to monitor the implementations of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with particular reference to climate change.

However, Senator Farhatullah Babar lamented how most national decisions were taken in light of security, rather than welfare of the people.

“Ours is a security driven state in which decisions are taken largely on the basis of security considerations instead of welfare of the people. If the state’s policies are not reoriented there is no likelihood of success in achieving the SDGs targets.”

Published in The Express Tribune, November 12th, 2015.]]>
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			<title>The vision of Pakistan</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/936249/the-vision-of-pakistan</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/936249/the-vision-of-pakistan#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 11 Aug 15 22:27:40 +0500</pubDate>
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				<![CDATA[rasul.bakhsh.rais]]>
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			<category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
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				<![CDATA[Jinnah visualised neutrality of the state in religious matters, a concept essential for internal stability]]>
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				<![CDATA[With the nation celebrating its 68th Independence Day as a moment of joy, the occasion also provides us with an opportunity to think about the vision and the objective of creating the new state of Pakistan. The vision that pulled the diverse Muslim communities from different regions of British India together in demanding and finally winning an independent homeland in the Muslim majority areas of the subcontinent became subject to many conflicting interpretations. This was not unusual though. Every post-colonial state has been through this process. In contrast to Pakistan, however, other comparable states were able to resolve the question of what kind of state and society they wanted their country to be. They did it through the agency of a nationalist party, charismatic leadership and political institutions.

Pakistan found itself in too much of a deficit in every quality that could keep the country on track for achieving the vision that the founders had outlined, most notably Mohammad Ali Jinnah in his August 11, 1947 speech in the Constituent Assembly. There cannot be any other authentic account of the vision of Pakistan than this address of Jinnah at the premier institution that had before it the dual tasks of writing a new constitution and also legislating to deal with a wide range of issues. The importance of this speech also lies in the fact that it was Jinnah’s first speech as the president of the Assembly. The speech touches on a diversity of subjects, from the importance of a law-based society to corruption and nepotism, termed “poison” to highlighting the challenges of poverty, equality and communal harmony. The essence of this remarkable speech, however, lies in three very modern ideas of state and nationhood.

First, there would be equal citizenship rights for every one regardless of religion, ethnicity and caste. What Jinnah meant by this formulation was the territorial conception of citizenship, discounting religious affiliations. Second, territorial citizenship will dissolve the differences and make Hindus, Muslims and communities of other faiths equal in rights and obligations. Finally, religion was a private matter of the individual, and the state had nothing to do with it. In other words, what Jinnah visualised was neutrality of the state in religious matters, a concept that is essential for internal peace and stability.

These are some of the Enlightenment ideas many post-colonial leaders, including Jinnah, liberally borrowed from Western civilisation. Jinnah was a constitutionalist in his training, profession and practical politics. It is unfortunate that every school of thought and political strand have attempted to interpret Jinnah to sell their own specific brand of politics and ideology. This is always true when it comes to great leaders in history because their popularity carries a heavy weight of argument on the side of conflicting political brands.

Pakistan lost track of Jinnah’s path even before it could walk any significant distance on it. The influence of mullahs, the weakening of Jinnah’s successors and the disintegration of the spirit of Pakistan brought into prominence leaders and political forces that had nothing to do with the founder’s vision. In less than a decade, bureaucratic-military leaders captured the state apparatus and reduced Jinnah merely to a symbolic portrait to hang behind their desks in offices.

No wonder, then, that the destiny of Pakistan over the decades has become disputed. The religious right demands an Islamic state, simply to capture power in the name of religion and do the same things the ‘moderate’ parties and leaders do. The ruling political establishment of Pakistan has used power as an opportunity to rob and run, leaving behind nothing but chaos, disorder, and finally, extremism and terrorism.

Pakistan can recover its lost vision. For this to happen, it will have to bring the corrupt, thoughtless political establishment within the bounds of law and accountability. That will be the new beginning.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 12th, 2015.

Like Opinion &amp; Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.]]>
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			<title>National Minorities Day: Lawmakers vow to end misuse of blasphemy law against non-Muslims</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/936060/lawmakers-discuss-floods-dam-construction-in-na</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/936060/lawmakers-discuss-floods-dam-construction-in-na#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 11 Aug 15 09:37:59 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[zahid.gishkori]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=936060</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Lawmakers pass resolution paying tribute to sacrifices made by minority communities in Pakistan]]>
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				<![CDATA[On National Minorities Day in Pakistan, parliamentarians have vowed to fight for the rights of persecuted minority communities, and in particular, work towards stopping forced conversion of Hindus and misuse of blasphemy laws against non-Muslims.

August 11 is celebrated as National Minorities Day in Pakistan, prompting the National Assembly on Tuesday (today) to pay homage to minority communities in the country.

Read: Girl from minority community clinches first position in Intermediate exams

A resolution marking the national day, moved by Minister for Ports and Shipping Kamran, was passed unanimously.

“We pay tribute to the patriotic minority members who sacrificed their lives in war against terror — also for their services in different fields particularly education and health,” read the resolution.

The resolution came in the wake of a motion about minorities moved by Member of National Assembly (MNA) Munnaza Hassan of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

Leader of the Opposition Syed Khurshid Shah while speaking on the motion, said, “It is a testing time for non-Muslims and other minorities whose persecution could not be stopped, unfortunately, by the rulers.”

Read: Minority representation: Non-Muslim seats to remain vacant in two neighbourhood councils

He further said that the Pakistan Peoples Party’s (PPP) government in its tenure took a number of steps for the welfare of minorities but they were not enough. “We should go extra mile to protect them (non-Muslims],” he added.

NA divided over construction of dams

In another development, the National Assembly witnessed divided opinion over a key issue of construction of dams, particularly Kalabagh Dam, where lawmakers failed to build consensus on it.

Lawmakers across party lines called for the expedited construction of dams. MNA Muzammil Qureshi presented a resolution before lawmakers, urging the government to take immediate steps for construction of new water reservoirs in order to control the shortage of water.

Debate triggered a month after monsoon flooding displaced over 1.5 million people, destroying over million acres crops this year. Since the flash floods started ravaging various parts of the country in mid-July, over 200 people have been killed and 128 injured so far.

“A war of water has been triggered now. We will have to pave way for Bhasha Dam and only by building it quickly, will we be able to mitigate water woes,” observed PPP-Sherpao MNA Aftab Sherpao.

PTI MNA Amjad Khan called for an all parties’ conference to take up the issue, while Awami Muslim League MNA Sheikh Rashid called for building small dams in an attempt to overcome the water crisis.

The construction of the Kalabagh Dam, however, was strongly opposed by Mahmood Achakzai of the Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party, who said that the Swat River could meet the electricity demands of the whole country.

Further, it was said during the session that Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa could generate enough electricity with Sindh not lagging far behind. Similarly, PPP MNA Yousuf Talpur also opposed the idea of the Kalabagh Dam, suggesting instead that canals, small dams and water storage units be constructed.

“There is a need for construction of small dams to conserve water and prevent the wastage of flood water,” he observed.

Meanwhile, MNA Rashid Godail of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement said that dams should be built for agricultural purposes.

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) MNA Owais Leghari said small dams with the capacity to water thousands of acres of crops could be built if an efficient strategy was implemented.

“River Indus is a disaster for us. People from Mianwali, Bhakar, Layyah and Dera Ghazi Khan are victims of floods,” PML-N MNA Obaidullah Shadi Khail said, referring to the failure of political governments in constructing the Kalabagh Dam.

Although Pakistan PTI chief Imran Khan was not present in Tuesday’ proceedings, PTI MNA Arif Alvi said the environmental crisis must be taken into consideration.

“Water resource management must take up this issue as water security seems to be a bigger threat now,” he said.

Minister for Water and Power Khawaja Asif said that water was an extremely important subject and required detailed discussion.

Women’s parliamentarians’ funds

State Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Sheikh Aftab informed lawmakers that the government had allocated Rs20 billion for community development schemes to be implemented through DCOs to achieve Millennium Development Goals in different fields.

“We had allocated 12.5 billion rupees last year as well, he responded to a calling notice moved by MNA Shahida Rehmani pertaining to discrimination in the allocation of development funds to the women parliamentarians,” Aftab said.

NA-Bills

MNA Ramesh Kumar introduced a bill "The Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2015" which was referred to the Standing Committee on Law and Justice for further deliberation. MNA Nafeesa Inayatullah presented "The Right to Free and Compulsory Education (Amendment) Bill, 2015".

It was also referred to the committee concerned for deliberations.]]>
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			<title>Minorities’ rights: Curricula to promote tolerance, SC hears</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/797278/minorities-rights-curricula-to-promote-tolerance-sc-hears</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/797278/minorities-rights-curricula-to-promote-tolerance-sc-hears#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 26 Nov 14 04:53:11 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[our.correspondent]]>
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			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=797278</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Top court seeks reports on implementation of its June 19 verdict]]>
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				<![CDATA[The Supreme Court has sought reports from all provincial governments on implementation of its landmark June 19 judgment regarding protection of the rights of minority communities.


The apex court on June 19 had asked the federal government to constitute a national council for minorities’ rights and a special task force for the protection of minorities’ places of worship. It had also directed to develop appropriate curricula to promote religious tolerance and to curb hate speeches.



The top court in its June 19 ruling had also directed that the SC office shall open a separate file to be placed before the three-judge bench to ensure that this judgment is given effect to in letter and spirit.

It had also noted that the said bench may also entertain complaints/petitions concerning violation of fundamental rights of minorities in the country.

In view of its judgment, the top court on November 19 took up the matter after the passage of five months and issued a notice to attorney general of Pakistan (AGP).

During the Tuesday hearing, Deputy Attorney General Sohail Mahmood appeared on behalf of the AGP before the SC’s three-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice Nasirul Mulk, and submitted reports by Ministry of Religious Affairs and Inter-faith Harmony and Establishment Division.

The ministry said that in compliance with the court’s June 19 order, the prime minister has approved the reconstitution of National Commission for Minorities. It said the commission has already held its first meeting on November 13.



The ministry said it has already directed capital administration and all chief secretaries to develop appropriate curricula at school and college levels to promote tolerance.

“The ministry has already asked all chief secretaries, Ministry of Interior and Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to take appropriate steps to discourage hate speeches in social media,” the report said.

In its report, the Establishment Division said it has directed all the departments to ensure five per cent quota of minorities in the jobs in view of the Article 260 (3) Constitution. According to the ministry, no complaint has been received so far in this regard.

Pakistan Hindu Council Chairman and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz MNA Dr Ramesh Kumar appeared before the bench and lamented that the court’s landmark judgment was not implemented so far. “If the verdict was implemented by concerned authorities then incidents like burning of a Christian couple in Kasur could not happen,” he said.

Dr Ramesh said that whenever he raises voice over the issues of minorities in the National Assembly, the NA Speaker tells him that these are provincial matters. Upon this, the bench asked him to file written submissions about his grievances, adding that it could not ignore the rights of minorities.

Later the bench adjourned hearing of the case till December 16.

Kot Radha Kishan incident

Meanwhile, after going through the report of IG Punjab and Punjab’s Minorities Affairs Department on Kot Radha Kishan incident, the CJP decided to fix the matter before the bench and issued notices to concerned deputy and regional police officers (DPO and RPO).

On November 4, an angry mob had brutally killed a Christian couple after blaming it for desecrating pages of the Holy Quran in the Kot Radha Kishan area of Kasur. Earlier, the court on November 19 sought reports from IG Punjab and Punjab’s Ministry of Minorities Affairs’ secretary on the matter.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 26th, 2014.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: Top court to follow up on its June 19 order</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/796667/minority-rights-top-court-to-follow-up-on-its-june-19-order</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/796667/minority-rights-top-court-to-follow-up-on-its-june-19-order#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 25 Nov 14 05:10:58 +0500</pubDate>
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				<![CDATA[our.correspondent]]>
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			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
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				<![CDATA[Notice issued to Attorney General for Pakistan Salman Aslam Butt]]>
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				<![CDATA[The Supreme Court will hear on Tuesday (today) a case related to the non-implementation of its June 19 landmark judgment regarding protection of rights of minority communities.


A notice has been issued to Attorney General for Pakistan Salman Aslam Butt but his deputy, Sohail Mahmood, will appear before a three-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice Nasirul Mulk, which will take up the case.

On November 7, the top court had sent reminders to the prime minister, provincial chief ministers and chief secretaries, law ministry, establishment division, IGPs and others to submit their reports regarding measures they have taken for the implementation of its order. However, no report has been received as yet, a court official said.

Earlier, the AGP office had also dispatched letters to various ministries, seeking progress reports regarding measures they have taken for the implementation of the June 19 verdict. “Since the matter is likely to be fixed [for hearing] in near future, representatives of ministries should send their reports immediately,” read the AGP’s letter.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 25th, 2014.]]>
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			<title>Slain minister's brother to speak at Vatican gathering</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/549902/slain-ministers-brother-to-speak-at-vatican-gathering</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/549902/slain-ministers-brother-to-speak-at-vatican-gathering#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 15 May 13 18:54:04 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[afp]]>
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			<category><![CDATA[World]]></category>
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			<description>
				<![CDATA[The international gathering is part of the Catholic Church's drive to inspire a &quot;new evangelisation&quot;.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Pakistani religious freedom advocate Paul Bhatti, the brother of slain federal minister Shahbaz Bhatti, will speak in front of Pope Francis and some 120,000 members of new Catholic religious movements on Saturday, the Vatican said.

The international gathering is part of the Catholic Church's drive to inspire a "new evangelisation" forged by the pope's predecessor Benedict XVI and it is timed to coincide with Pentecost, the feast of the Holy Spirit.

"A lot of young people from these ecclesiastical realities have not only recovered a faith lost or turned sterile but have accomplished a true conversion," Renato Fisichella, the Vatican's point man for evangelisation, said on Wednesday.

Dynamic religious movements like Communion and Liberation, the Neo-Catechumenal Way and Legionaries of Christ, which have drawn thousands of followers, will be represented at the meeting.

Paul Bhatti, a Catholic like his brother, is minister of national harmony and minority affairs and head of the All Pakistan Minorities Alliance.]]>
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			<title>Of particular concern</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/546987/of-particular-concern</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/546987/of-particular-concern#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Fri, 10 May 13 17:40:47 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[amina.jilani]]>
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			<category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
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			<description>
				<![CDATA[Pakistan was designated as a &quot;country of particular concern&quot; by a US report on International Religious Freedom.]]>
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				<![CDATA[It seems that Pakistan’s leaders will never realise and never admit their detrimental effect upon the nation and its standing in today’s world.

Throughout the election campaign, very little has been said by our aspiring leaders to uphold the freedoms that are now expected to exist in a civilised and democratic state. On April 30, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) released its 2013 annual report. Found to be one of the worst countries in the world when it comes to an abundant lack of tolerance, it was recommended that Pakistan be designated as a “country of particular concern”.

As related by Foreign Affairs on April 30, in a write-up by the director of policy and research at the USCIRF: “An array of repressive laws, including the much abused blasphemy law and religiously discriminatory anti-Ahmadi laws, foster an atmosphere of violent extremism and vigilantism. The growth of militant groups espousing a violent religious ideology who undertake attacks, impact all Pakistanis and threatens the country’s security and stability.” He suggests that the report allows facts to speak for themselves and uses this quote from it:

“The Pakistani government failed to effectively intervene against a spike in targeted violence against the Shia Muslim minority community, as well as violence against other minorities. With elections scheduled for May 2013, additional attacks against religious minorities and candidates deemed ‘un-Islamic’ will likely occur. Chronic conditions remain, including the poor social and legal status of non-Muslim religious minorities and the severe obstacles to free discussion of sensitive religious and social issues faced by the majority Muslim community. The country’s blasphemy laws, used predominantly in Punjab but also nationwide, target members of religious minority communities and dissenting Muslims and this frequently results in imprisonment. The USCIRF is aware of at least 16 individuals on death row and 20 more serving life sentences. The blasphemy law, along with anti-Ahmadi laws that effectively criminalise various practices of their faith, has created a climate of vigilante violence. Hindus have suffered from the climate of violence and hundreds have fled Pakistan for India. Human rights and religious freedom are increasingly under assault, particularly women, members of religious minority communities, and those in the majority Muslim community whose views are deemed “un-Islamic”. The government has proven unwilling or unable to confront militants perpetrating acts of violence against other Muslims and religious minorities.”

We expect only silence on religious freedom from President Asif Ali Zardari and his men and women of the Zardari PPP as they have shown a remarkable consistency over the past, really distasteful, five years in ignoring and keeping firmly away from any hint of doing away with or even amending laws that are directly confrontational towards the freedom of religion and even of thought.

Some other leaders’ records are also not exactly shining when it comes to any let-up on religious intolerance and bigotry, but perhaps, one did expect more from the great Khan rather than the stand taken on the Ahmadis. After all, the first objective of the PTI constitution is: “To make Pakistan an egalitarian, modern and Islamic welfare state that upholds the fundamental rights of the people in which all citizens, regardless of gender, caste, creed or religion can live in peace, harmony and happiness.” The MQM, to give it due credit, is the sole party that publicly makes the right noises.

The wholesale pandering to the religious right, whether through fear, power-lust or conviction, is reprehensible and can never, in any way, further the cause of this republic.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 11th, 2013.]]>
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			<title>Govt committed to the rights of minorities: PM Ashraf</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/483134/govt-committed-to-the-rights-of-minorities-pm-ashraf</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/483134/govt-committed-to-the-rights-of-minorities-pm-ashraf#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sun, 23 Dec 12 07:06:56 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[our.correspondent]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=483134</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[He was addressing a Christmas function at Fatima Church in Sector F-8/4.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[The decision to reserve 5% of federal jobs and additional seats in the national and provincial assemblies for minorities is proof of the government’s commitment to them.


This was said by Prime Minister (PM) Raja Pervez Ashraf on Saturday. He was addressing a Christmas function at Fatima Church in Sector F-8/4.

These changes will be implemented once the National Assembly (NA) passes the 23rd constitutional amendment bill tabled on December 17.

After the amendment, the number of reserved seats for minorities in the NA will increase from 10 to 14.

The number of reserved seats for minorities in Punjab assembly will go up from eight to 10 (out of a total of 373 seats), in Sindh from nine to 12 (total 171 seats), in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa from three to four (total 125 seats) and in Balochistan from three to four (total 66 seats).

PM Ashraf said the government is committed to protecting minority rights. He urged the followers of every religion to stand together and promote shared values of compassion, moderation, tolerance and love.

“Our government has proposed inter-faith dialogue as a long term measure for achieving sustainable peace and harmony,” he said, adding, “We cannot let a few extremists [trying to sow seeds of suspicion] attack our shared values.”

School children on the occasion sang Christmas carols. The prime minister also cut a cake, wishing Christians a merry Christmas on behalf of the government and the people.

PM Ashraf also commended the services of late Shahbaz Bhatti, who was assassinated in March 2011 while he was the minister for minorities affairs.

He was an outspoken critic of the blasphemy law in Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 23rd, 2012. ]]>
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			<title>Treatment of minorities</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/481626/treatment-of-minorities-2</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/481626/treatment-of-minorities-2#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 19 Dec 12 19:12:21 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[editorial]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Editorial]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=481626</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[If change is going to come it will be painfully slow because it requires society to change itself.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[A new report released by the National Commission of Justice and Peace provides yet more evidence that the constitutional rights guaranteed to minorities exist only on paper and rarely in practice. According to the report, at least nine different places of worship, including five churches, one temple and one Ahmadi place of worship, have been destroyed this year. Of the nine, eight were attacked by mobs while the Ahmadi place of worship was dismantled by the police. The double standard here is glaring. Authorities dare not take action against mosques that may have violated building codes and are patently unsafe or those built on encroached land. And, just a few days ago, the Punjab government backed down from a proposal to charge mosques the same rate for gas as others are charged. Meanwhile, minorities have to worry about their lives each time they enter their places of worship.

The problem is not just of legal indifference to the rights of minorities but active societal discrimination. A combination of factors makes it all but impossible for minorities to receive the same rights as those of the majority faith. Religious intolerance in society is often exploited by those who have more worldly aims. Often, opportunists are looking simply to take over lucrative land and hence whip up sentiment against minority groups to take over their property. The police, unwilling to get involved in ostensibly religious disputes, simply step aside and even refuse to register cases. Once religious fervour has been tapped, prosecutors and judges are too afraid to do their jobs properly. At every level of society, both civil and official, fear and bigotry end up ruling.



Those few brave individuals, like Salmaan Taseer and Shahbaz Bhatti, who dare to speak up against this injustice are promptly assassinated and, even in death, further marginalised by spineless politicians. It is too easy to say that the state needs to start protecting the rights of minorities when there is a distinct lack of leadership on the issue. If change is going to come it will be painfully slow because it requires society to change itself, to stop giving into its worst instincts and finally learn the value of humanity. It requires a revolution in education where bigotry is replaced by tolerance. We can only change society if we first change ourselves from within.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 20th, 2012.]]>
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			<title>Fear, persecution and intolerance</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/458409/fear-persecution-and-intolerance</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/458409/fear-persecution-and-intolerance#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 30 Oct 12 16:40:30 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[zahrah.nasir]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=458409</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Fear &amp;amp; persecution of ‘others’ equates to fear &amp;amp; persecution of ‘self’ which for Pakistan, is a sad state of affairs.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[Existing on the edge of fear has become the norm for the vast majority of people in Pakistan. Once known for its remarkable hospitality, suspicion of absolutely everyone governs how people react on the streets, in shops and in other places where strangers have no option but to mingle. Given the current unrest, nay, let’s be honest and call a spade a spade: given the ‘civil war’ we have been so blindly living in for the past few years, suspicion is understandable. But one unfortunate thing, amongst many other things, of course, is that despite the indisputable fact that this civil war is being fought by Muslims against Muslims, the population at large appears to have turned almost completely against Pakistanis of other faiths, too.

Christians, Hindus, Sikhs and any other minority community to whom Pakistan has always been home, are increasingly victimised, persecuted and as appears to have become the trend of late, charged with blasphemy for no reason other than that they happen to own something, usually property or land, that someone else wants to get their filthy hands on. This targeting, irrespective of whether they are men, women or children belonging to other faiths, has knocked both religious and cultural pluralism firmly on the head. It is a very retrograde step indeed, all angles duly considered; a step which serves only to push this supposed ‘land of the pure’ even closer to being a ‘land of the narrow-minded, bigoted fanatics’ over which uneducated mullahs rule all and sundry and in which the word ‘freedom’ — be this freedom of thought, act or deed — has been deleted from the dictionary of the human right to live in peace.

Pakistan is, of course, an Islamic country but this, as insisted by the father of the nation himself, most certainly does not remove the rights of those of other faiths to which the country is also home. Yet, their rights are rapidly being erased with the result that those who can are bailing out for pastures new and far safer than if they were to fight for their birthrights here.

Just because someone happens to be of a different faith does not mean that they should be viewed as enemies which is, frankly speaking, how Muslims — through no fault of our own — are now viewed by the world at large. Knowing how abhorrent it feels to be treated with hurtful disrespect and utter disdain should make Muslims think twice about maltreating those of other religious persuasions. However, selfishly insular as the general population has become, it has done nothing of the sort and as a direct result of this insularity, the standard of life has been seriously degraded for all.

Just across our eastern border, people of many religious denominations live side by side in complete harmony: mosques, temples, churches and other places of worship stand in close proximity and all go about their daily lives and routines — religious, educational and otherwise — with smiles on their faces and happiness in the air. They live, or so it appears, in a state of bliss, which has long since been relegated to the history books here.

Fear and persecution of ‘others’ equates to fear and persecution of ‘self’ which is, for Pakistan, an extremely sad state of affairs, indeed.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 31st, 2012.]]>
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			<title>No lack of protection for Hindus in Sindh, says Excise &amp; Taxation minister</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/458271/no-lack-of-protection-for-hindus-in-sindh-says-excise-taxation-minister</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/458271/no-lack-of-protection-for-hindus-in-sindh-says-excise-taxation-minister#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 30 Oct 12 09:38:46 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
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			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=458271</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Notion pertaining to lack of protection of Hindus baseless, propaganda spread by certain elements, says Chawla.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[The notion pertaining to lack of protection of Hindus in Sindh is baseless and certain elements were spreading such propaganda to serve their own vested interests, stated Sindh Minister for Excise and Taxation, Mukesh Kumar Chawla Tuesday.

He was talking to a representative delegation of the Hindu community at his office.

The minister informed the delegation that the present democratic government was aware of the problems of the minority community and added that a 15-member committee has been formed on the directives of President Asif Ali Zardari in this regard.

He said that the committee will prepare its recommendation for the resolution of problems faced by the community and the government will ensure strict implementation of these recommendations.

Chawla also pointed out that minorities enjoy full freedom as per the Constitution of Pakistan. The 1973 constitution guarantees protection to the minority community, he added.

The minister said that the Hindu community is playing a prominent role in the development of the province and added that the government is providing full protection to minorities.

The members of the delegation expressed satisfaction at the measures taken by the government.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: In shadow of insecurity, Hindus plan exodus</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/442002/minority-rights-in-shadow-of-insecurity-hindus-plan-exodus</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/442002/minority-rights-in-shadow-of-insecurity-hindus-plan-exodus#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 25 Sep 12 00:07:46 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[zahid.gishkori]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=442002</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Nearly 1,000 families are planning to leave for India.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[Amid a mounting sense of insecurity, close to 1,000 families belonging to the country’s largest religious minority group, Hindus, plan to migrate to India — a step likely to raise more questions about Pakistan’s ability to protect its minorities.


A group of 171 Hindus has already crossed the border into India after a string of incidents — especially the contentious issue of forced conversions and marriages of Hindu girls.

Prominent Hindu leaders told The Express Tribune on Monday that their plan of migrating to India came at a time when several Hindu families in Jodhpur, a city in Rajasthan state, which shares a border with Sindh, expressed willingness to welcome the migrants.

“Migration tendency in the Hindu community is on the rise in Pakistan,” said the director of Hare Rama Foundation (HRF), a private organisation working for the rights of the scheduled caste of Hindus. “One thousand [Hindu] families have planned this migration,” claimed Ramesh Jaipal, who recently conducted a survey to study “Exodus of Hindus families... a reality?”

Their visas are under process and they are most likely migrating to India in October or November, he revealed.

The migration plans surfaced after Indian authorities extended a soft corner to Pakistani migrants in Jodhpur. Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has reportedly assured his full support to Pakistani Hindu families seeking asylum in India.

Some 7,000 Pakistani migrants, living mostly in camps in Rajasthan, will be awarded Indian nationality if they are able to provide proper documentation, Indian media reports said.

A Hindu lawmaker, Manwer Lal, of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, also confirmed the migration of a number of families to India. He, however, rebutted that there was an exodus.

Around 65 Hindus families have migrated from Rahim Yar Khan and various areas of Sindh and Balochistan to India through the Attari border during the last three months, the HRF survey report claimed.

The key reason behind the planed migration from Rahim Yar Khan is said to be the abduction of a Hindu girl, Kiran Kumari, by four people belonging to the Mehar tribe, who are the followers of Pir Pagara, said Ramesh.

In the light of this development, the National Assembly’s standing committee on human rights chairman Riaz Fatiana has summoned a meeting on October 8 where representatives of the Hindu community will brief the panel. “We will ensure safety of all minorities. We will not let them to migrate. Hindus are [a part] of our homeland.”

MNA Nafisa Shah was unaware of any such move from any part of Sindh. According to her, Hindus have social and religious ties across the border just like Muslims do and they therefore are both visitors and tourists.  “Our religious minorities are not insecure,” she told The Express Tribune.

President Asif Ali Zardari has also constituted a committee to look into reports of the mass migration to India. Senator Maula Bux Chandio is presiding over the committee which will discuss issues related to persecution of minorities.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 25th, 2012.]]>
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			<title>Intolerance growing in South Punjab: Report</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/430418/intolerance-growing-in-south-punjab-report</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/430418/intolerance-growing-in-south-punjab-report#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Mon, 03 Sep 12 05:29:01 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[zahid.gishkori]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[K-P]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=430418</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Report by the Minority Rights Commission states minorities in the region have been living in fear of persecution.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[South Punjab, perhaps the most impoverished region of the province, has little to offer to its religious minorities.


With growing discrimination and a flawed registration system, members of minority communities in the region have been living in fear of persecution, according to a report by the Minority Rights Commission.

Over 0.25 million non-Muslims live in five districts of south Punjab – Rahim Yar Khan, Muzaffargarh, Multan, Layyah and Khanewal.

As a result of increasing persecution and discrimination, members of the Hindu community in the region are being forced to convert to Islam. Non-Muslim women are also being forced to change their religion and marry Muslim men.

According to the report, this new trend of forced conversions and forced marriages is on the rise in South Punjab, particularly in Rahim Yar Khan and adjacent areas.

School admissions refused

The report further revealed that growing intolerance and flaws in registration processes is shutting the doors to education for minorities in the region.

In Rahim Yar Khan, members of minority communities, particularly Hindus, are unable to register their children in government schools, which have refused admissions due to the absence of birth certificates.

Furthermore, without Computerised National Identity Cards, over 150,000 non-Muslims have been unable to register their children for secondary school examinations since 2001.

Hindus are also unable to get their marriages registered in the absence of formal laws in the country.

Land grabbers

Furthermore, the report claims that in Muzaffargarh district, land grabbers have snatched hundreds of acres of cultivated land from Christian families, who have been tilling the land for the last 35 years. Over 20,000 non-Muslims reside in the district.

Balmiki Hindus, a sect of the religion, are facing their own share of alleged highhandedness by Muslims in Multan, where the community has lost their ancestral graveyard to the land-grab mafia.

Multan has allegedly attracted the binary attention of jihadis and religious fanatics due its significance as the new hub of political power and economic activity.

The Auqaf Department in Multan receives millions of rupees as rent from the commercial properties of Hindus, but the money is spent on Muslim, instead of Hindu, festivals, the report claimed.

The minority community has staged demonstrations against this injustice but authorities concerned have failed to take any action so far.

False accusations

Layyah district, where over 20,000 non Muslims reside, is also witnessing a peculiar trend of false accusations of desecration of the holy Quran and blasphemy against minorities.

A majority of non Muslims in Shantinagar, Khanewal district, have been living in fear since decades. In 1997, 900 houses burnt out in a village in the area after it was alleged that pages of the Holy Quran were burned by local non Muslims.

The quota for non Muslim women in government jobs in the district has also been restricted.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 3rd, 2012.

&nbsp;]]>
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			<title>With government unable to solve their problems, Hindus boycott state sponsored Holi</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/359216/with-government-unable-to-solve-their-problems-hindus-boycott-state-sponsored-holi</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/359216/with-government-unable-to-solve-their-problems-hindus-boycott-state-sponsored-holi#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 03 Apr 12 17:42:45 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[azam.khan]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=359216</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Government forced to cancel all its Holi-related celebrations after community refuses to participate.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[Unhappy with government inaction over rising cases of forced conversion, abduction for kidnapping, the Hindu community on Tuesday boycotted all government sponsored functions planned for Holi celebrations across the country.

Representatives of the minority community approached the ministry of Interfaith Harmony and formally conveyed them their decision and asked the ministry to cancel all Holi-related festivities.

Akram Gill, minister for Interfaith Harmony, confirmed the development and said that Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) members in the National Assembly Ramesh Lal, Lal Chand and Dr Mahesh Kumar and Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s (MQM) Manohar Lal approached the ministry.

Quoting these minority members of the parliament, Gill said, “We are disheartened at the unprecedented incidents of forceful conversions, abductions for ransom and killings of Hindu community members in Sindh.” In protest, they asked for the cancellation of Holi-related programs.

Dr Paul Bhatti, the Advisor to the prime minister for National Harmony, told The Express Tribune that the Parliamentary Secretary of Interfaith Ministry Reena Kumari had also suggested the cancellation of Holi-related functions scheduled for March 18 (Holi).

Kumari said that throughout the country, the Hindu community was not celebrating Holi in its true spirit due to the injustices they were subjected to.

“We accepted the decision of the majority and cancelled our planned programmes on the occasion of Holi in honour of the Hindu community,” said Dr Bhatti and Gill.

PPP Hindu members disappointed with party members

Araish Kumar of Pakistan Muslim League – Nawaz (PML-N) said that his community members were in trouble and large scale migration is underway.

He said that currently there were around 100 families in Delhi even as their visas neared expiration. Citing visa regime obstacles between India and Pakistan, he said that thousands of Hindus are waiting to migrate to India.

In a meeting with MNA Lal Chand, Chief Minister Sindh Qaim Ali Shah had telephoned the relevant quarters for security to be provided to the Hindu community but to no avail, he revealed.

Meanwhile, MNA Dr Mahesh Kumar said that there is a law and order situation in the province of Sindh.

He revealed his concern about the alleged negative role of his party co-worker, MNA Mian Mitho of Bharchondi Sharif for the forceful conversion of Hindu girls. “I also talked against my party MNA on the floor of the assembly and I also discussed the matter with my party leadership,” he said.

Referring to a number of incidents of target killing, MNA Kishan Chand Parwani held the government responsible for the crimes. “At least the government should keep an eye on its own party members,” he demanded, alleging local PPP leaders were involved in the murder of four Hindu doctors in Shikarpur but the government had failed to take any action against them.

“I think the PPP is not sincere over the minorities’ issues despite fetching 85 per cent of the minorities’ votes,” Parwani lamented.

Ramesh Lal of the PPP, however, was reluctant to talk on the issue, sidestepping the question by saying he was busy with preparations of the death anniversary of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in Larkana.]]>
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			<title>Govt must protect minorities’ places of worship: Minister</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/358265/will-record-protest-if-govt-doesnt-safeguard-minority-worship-places-paul-bhatti</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/358265/will-record-protest-if-govt-doesnt-safeguard-minority-worship-places-paul-bhatti#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sun, 01 Apr 12 08:36:51 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[zahid.gishkori]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=358265</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Says 'minorities in Pakistan are in deep trouble'.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[Minister In-charge of National Harmony Dr Paul Bhatti said on Sunday that he would raise objections in the parliament if the government fails to safeguard the places of worship of minorities, particularly the Hindu community.

“Minorities in Pakistan are in deep trouble,” Bhatti told the Express Tribune.

“The government should be committed to safeguard the places of worship of all minorities in the country and all possible steps should be taken for the care and maintenance of these places,” said Bhatti.

Taking notice of the Hindu community’s protest in front of the National Press Club in Islamabad for the repossession of their temple, the minister said that no one should be allowed to occupy their places of worship.

He also directed the concerned authorities to take up the matter and resolve it at the earliest.

More than 30 Hindus from Tehsil Zafarwal in Norowal district took part in the protest on Friday.

Bhatti said: “We should respect the places of worship of others and demonstrate tolerance to establish peace in the country in order to promote interfaith harmony. All religions are integral parts of the society."

“Interfaith harmony can only be achieved through interfaith relationship,” added Bhatti. “Interfaith dialogue and harmony among the people of different faiths can create an environment of peace and tolerance in the society.”

“We should have interactions to understand each other’s point of views.”

He further said that peace was necessary for the development of the country and the socioeconomic uplift of the minorities so that the people of different faiths can sit together and work for the welfare of the nation.]]>
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			<title>Why are we so afraid of our minorities?</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/354903/why-are-we-so-afraid-of-our-minorities</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/354903/why-are-we-so-afraid-of-our-minorities#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sun, 25 Mar 12 17:41:52 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[Syed Mohammad Ali .]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Opinion]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=354903</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Much more needs to be done to ensure protection of the minorities as it is enshrined in our Constitution]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[Injustices faced by minority populations remain a problem around the world, ranging from the plight of migrants in western countries, to Kurdish troubles in the Middle East, to the discrimination faced by the significant Muslims minority in India.

Leaving aside the plight of sectarian and ethnic tensions, Pakistan itself has but a miniscule religious minority, protecting the rights of which should hardly pose a significant challenge for the state. Yet, our track record in this regard remains dismal. A latest “Life on the Margins” study by the National Commission for Justice and Peace, is quite perturbing as well. Over 75 per cent of the surveyed women who work reported being subjected to sexual harassment. The literacy rate of these women was found to be 10 percentage points below the national rate (57 per cent) and the infant mortality rate among them was higher than the national average. It was also disconcerting to note that nearly 62 per cent of Hindu and Christian women fear that a majority of Muslims would not come to their aid if they were being discriminated against.

These fears are substantiated considering the prevalence of forced conversions to Islam and increasing incidents of kidnappings which have instilled a deep sense of insecurity amongst our minority communities. The Human Rights Commission’s Balochistan chapter has identified an ongoing exodus of Hindu families from Quetta due to the fear of kidnappings for ransom, yet the Balochistan government does not seem to be doing much to address this problem.

NGO reports indicate that over 568 FIRs for forced marriages were lodged last year across 40 districts of Pakistan, with the majority of such cases having been filed in Sindh. While many Muslim women and girls are also forced into marriage within our country, females in minority communities are even more vulnerable to such coercion since they face a ‘double jeopardy’ of being subjected to discrimination due to their sex and religion.

The government has taken some steps for empowering minorities by fixing a five per cent quota in government jobs, reserving four seats for minorities in the Upper House and declaration of August 11 as ‘Minorities Day’. It was also encouraging to note minority rights being discussed during the recent National Assembly proceedings and acknowledgement by incumbent parliamentarians of the need for enacting legislation to better protect minority rights and to particularly curb the phenomenon of forced conversions. Another proposal which merits further political support is helping minority women feel less alienated from the country’s politics by instituting a parliamentary quota to be established to resolve this discrepancy. Yet, the inclusion of one or two reserved seats for minority women within the national or provincial assemblies will hardly be enough. Much more needs to be done to ensure protection of the minorities as it is enshrined in our Constitution.

The judiciary and the executive also need to overcome their existing complacency and take a much more proactive stance in safeguarding vulnerable minorities from blatant incidences of exploitation and violence. Moreover, the silent majority within our country must also overcome its complacency or indifference and denounce this unbearable level of intolerance. Until this occurs, the existing myopia towards vulnerable minorities will just continue spilling over to further exacerbate strife perpetuated in the name of other divergences, be they sectarian or ethnic in nature.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 26th, 2012.]]>
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			<title>Double jeopardy: The smaller the minority the bigger its problems in Pakistan</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/352795/double-jeopardy-the-smaller-the-minority-the-bigger-its-problems-in-pakistan</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/352795/double-jeopardy-the-smaller-the-minority-the-bigger-its-problems-in-pakistan#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 20 Mar 12 22:32:24 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[our.correspondent]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Sindh]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=352795</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Report released on survey of 1,000 Christian and Hindu women from Sindh and Punjab.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Nearly 62 per cent of Hindu and Christian women fear that a majority of Muslims would not come to their aid if they were being discriminated against.


This was one of the findings of the study “Life on the Margins,” which was released by the National Commission for Justice and Peace at the Pakistan Medical Association House on Tuesday. The study is based on interviews of 1,000 women in 26 districts of Punjab and Sindh from 2010 and 2011.

Forty-three per cent of the women surveyed complained that they faced religious discrimination at either their workplace, educational institution or neighbourhood, while 27 per cent of them faced difficulties in gaining admissions to educational institutions. A majority of non-Muslim children polled said that they were forced to study Islamiat in school. Of the working women, 76 per cent said that they had to deal with sexual harassment.

The report points out that the literacy rate of these women is 47 per cent, which is below the 57 per cent national literacy rate. The infant mortality rate among minority communities turned out to be 314 infant deaths for every 3,050 live births, or 10.30 per cent, which is higher when compared with the World Health Organisation’s figure of the 8.7 per cent national infant mortality rate. Nearly 20 per cent of women were earning less than the minimum wage, 15 per cent of them lived in mud houses and 12 per cent in semi-brick ones.

While speaking at the occasion, the newly ordained Archbishop of Karachi, Joseph Coutts, emphasised action and support. “These issues will not be resolved unless the silent majority accepts that they exist in society,” he said. He compared the current state of denial of these issues to the one that once existed about  Aids when people would not even talk about it. He called for a documentation of cases of kidnappings, forced marriages and conversions within minority communities.

Justice (retd) Majida Rizvi declined to comment about the controversy surrounding Rinkle Kumari’s conversion as the case was in court. However, she tried to raise the morale of members of the minority communities by saying that most of the people in the country were standing with them. “A majority of our population is not biased. It is just a small population of maulvis who spread hatred.”

Nearly 80 per cent of Pakistanis live on the margin, as they do not have access to justice and resources, and that the problems faced by women of minority communities were similar to those faced by Muslim women in the country. Nearly 66 per cent of non-Muslim women were not allowed to marry of their own free will, according to the report, and Rizvi said that a majority of Muslim women were also forced into marriage.

Mangla Sharma, who is the chairperson of the Pak-Hindu Welfare Association, said that minority women felt alienated from the country’s politics because they are not currently represented in parliament, and called for a quota to be established to resolve the discrepancy. Sharma also claimed that Rinkle Kumari was brainwashed and forcibly converted, and said that when a man claims to convert a woman, his religious background should be checked.

MPA Saleem Khokhar lauded the commission’s efforts for presenting a report on such a topic while extremism and injustice are on the rise. He said that blasphemy laws were being misused in the country, and referred to the deaths of a governor and a federal minister when they sympathised with Aasia Bibi.

The commission’s Peter Jacob called for a body to be set up to look into cases of forced conversions of non-Muslim women. The definition of the word “discrimination” should also be established, to include restrictions on the basis of religion as well.

Nazish Brohi, who contributed to the study, said that that women of minority communities face “double jeopardy,” as they have to face discrimination on two accounts: because of their sex and their religion.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 21st, 2012.]]>
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			<title>Captured land</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/324603/captured-land</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/324603/captured-land#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Fri, 20 Jan 12 16:40:38 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[editorial]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Editorial]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=324603</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[While Christian groups have been protesting, only a handful of activists from mainstream Muslim society have joined.]]>
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				<![CDATA[The Christian community in Lahore continues its desperate protests over the bulldozing conducted several days ago by the Lahore Development Authority of a school, a church and the ‘Gosha-e-Aman’ home for old people. The land on which the buildings stood had been on lease to the Catholic Church since 1887. The lease was not automatically renewed in 1987 and the matter is before the court. Christian leaders, including the Bishop of Lahore, Alexander John Malik accuse the Punjab government of seeking to seize the highly valuable two acres of land which stood in Garhi Shahu in the heart of Lahore. Minority leaders have strongly denied the claims made by the Punjab Minorities Minister, Kamran Michael, that the land had been taken over by a land mafia. He stated this was simply an excuse to take possession of property.

While Christian groups have been protesting fervently — joined by nuns from various convents in the city — only a handful of activists from mainstream Muslim society have joined them. This is, despite the fact that the Gosha-e-Aman home offered shelter to persons of all beliefs. The fact that few such facilities exist would suggest that every effort should have been made to protect it. Instead, the opposite was done by the government itself. Helpless inhabitants who had lived in the shelter for years saw it being torn down before their eyes, as they watched — in many cases — shedding tears. Church property was desecrated and attempts to obtain an immediate stay failed. The action does nothing to improve ties with a community which already feels marginalised, and this sidelining only adds to the growing social tensions we face. Media attention has also been too limited. The enormous services of missionaries in our land need to be acknowledged and the action at Garhi Shahu reversed immediately by a government which has demonstrated scorn for their efforts to better the lives of some of the most deprived members of our society.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 21st, 2012.]]>
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			<title>‘Illegal’ demolition: DCO told to explain ‘church property’ demolition</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/322368/christian-property-demolition-bishop-points-to-minister%e2%80%99s-involvement</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/322368/christian-property-demolition-bishop-points-to-minister%e2%80%99s-involvement#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Mon, 16 Jan 12 14:39:58 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[rabia.mehmood]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category><category><![CDATA[Punjab]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=322368</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[To file reply today, affected community continues to protest.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Justice Mansoor Ali Shah of Lahore High Court on Monday issued a notice to district coordination officer (DCO) to file by for Tuesday (today) his reply on the demolition and possession of Gosha-i-Aman by the Lahore Development Authority on January 10.

The action was taken on a petition by the Lahore Charitable Association, an affiliate of the Catholic Church, and the administration of a number of churches against DCO Ahad Khan Cheema for demolishing the building allegedly despite a stay order against the action.

Emmanuel Yousaf Mani, director of the National Commission on Justice and Peace, said that the demolished building was a property of the Catholic Church and they had a restraining order from the court against demolition.

Tariq Zaman, a city government officer, told The Express Tribune that the land was government property, however, in possession of a land-grab mafia. He said the group was led by a woman, who had deployed armed men around the property to resist demolition by the LDA officials. He said despite several attempts, the church had not been able to oust her. However, he said, now she had mysteriously disappeared.

Former residents of the demolished compound, however, said the woman had left the compound several days before it was bulldosed. One of them said, “Her possessions were not damaged. The DCO had allowed her to take them along.”

Protest against LDA

Meanwhile, hundreds of protesters from the Christian community protested against the demolition on Monday.

They said that the LDA officials had not informed them before demolishing the building.

“I have nowhere to go to. My home of 25 years was razed in front of my eyes and I could not do anything about it,” Zanobia Richards, 61, said.

Mariam Augustine, a teacher who had been living at Gosha-i-Aman for 14 years with her husband and two daughters, said, “Everything we owned is under the rubble. We have lost everything.”

Bishop of Lahore Rt Rev Dr Alexander John Malik said that despite announcement by Finance Minister Kamran Michael that the government will the land to a church in Garhi Shahu, church administration had not been contacted.

Father Morris Jalal of the Saint Francis Church in Kot Lakhpat told The Tribune, “Our protest is not just a matter of land. It is about a violation of minority rights in the country.”   Some of the protesters accused the government of colluding with the land grabbers. The protesters included representatives from 20 churches administration in the city.

Sisters from several convents also joined the three-hour demonstration.

The protesters reiterated that the minority communities continued to feel vulnerable in Pakistan. Activist Shahtaj Qizalbash of the Women Action Forum and Neelum Hussain of Simorgh also addressed the protest.

&nbsp;

Published in The Express Tribune, January 17th, 2012.]]>
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			<title>March polls: Four minority members to join Senate this year</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/320419/march-polls-four-minority-members-to-join-senate-this-year</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/320419/march-polls-four-minority-members-to-join-senate-this-year#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Thu, 12 Jan 12 11:55:59 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
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			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=320419</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[In March, 50 senators will complete their tenure but, to include minority members, polls will be held for 54 seats.]]>
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				<![CDATA[For the first time in the country’s history, four minority members will join the upper house of parliament following Senate elections scheduled for March this year.

Although ten seats are reserved in the National Assembly for minority members, there is no representation for minorities in the 100-member Senate. However, in August last year, President Zardari signed an amendment in the Senate (Election) Rules 1975, increasing the number of seats in the Senate to 104.

The step was taken under the 18th constitutional amendment, which stipulates that each provincial assembly will elect one minority member to the Senate. Two elected minority members will retire after completing three years while the remaining two will complete a full six-year term under the rules of the legislative body according to which one-half of its members retire after three years while the other half completes a full term of six years.

In March 2012, 50 senators are completing their stipulated tenure. However, to include the minority members, polls will be held for 54 seats. According to an official within the Senate Secretariat, who spoke on condition of anonymity, most senators retiring in March belong to the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid. Twenty of the party’s 21 members will be completing their term.

Among other parties, the official said, five of Pakistan Peoples Party’s 27, seven of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazl’s 10, one of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s seven, one of Awami National Party’s six and three of Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s six members will retire. One senator of the Balochistan National Party-Awami’s three and one of the National Party’s two will also retire. All three senators of Jamaat-e-Islami, one each from Jamhoori Watan Party, PML-Functional, PPP-Sherpao and Pakhtunkhwa Awami Milli Party will also finish their term. Four of Fata’s eight senators will also retire.

Polls will be held on seven general, two technocrat, two women and one non-Muslim seat from each province, four from Fata, and one general and one technocrat seat from Islamabad.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: Aiming for the stars, bounded by a wall</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/252660/aiming-for-the-stars-bounded-by-a-wall</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/252660/aiming-for-the-stars-bounded-by-a-wall#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Thu, 15 Sep 11 04:47:49 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[nadir.hassan]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=252660</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[School providing free education is attended by Christians only.]]>
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				<![CDATA[The Masihi Foundation School in France Colony is open for all but attended only by Christians. That is because France Colony, so-called because it is located in the area where the French Consulate used to be, is a walled-off parcel of land where some 600 Christians live segregated from the rest of Islamabad.

“People from outside the wall don’t want to come into the colony,” explains Xavier William, the country head for the Masihi Foundation. He compares the wall surrounding France Colony, which has only four entrances, to the Berlin Wall.

Worthy aims, limited access

Over 50 children sit in the classrooms of the school, which opened earlier this year and offers free education to anyone who wishes to enroll up to the primary level. The instruction is in English, making this a rare, English-medium school in a slum area and, as a student there says, they are given books, schoolbags and uniforms for free.

The Masihi Foundation, says William, is combating extremism by “bridging the gaps between communities and strengthening the marginalised communities by providing education, training and skills.”

Interestingly, the Masihi Foundation is also providing legal protection to Aasia Bibi, a Christian languishing in jail on blasphemy charges.  In France Colony, these worthy aims are stymied by the fact that only Christians are attending the school.

Squalid, congested

Ironically, France Colony is a squalid area, despite a majority of its residents working as cleaners for the Capital Development Authority. According to Yaqoob, a resident of the colony, the surrounding wall was built on the orders of influential Muslim residents in the area who didn’t want to have to pass through the area every day.

Each family lives in a tiny room, with as many as eight people packed into the constricted space. Despite living here for decades, residents have not been given ownership rights to the land by the government. There is also no provision for clean water and the sewerage system is overloaded.

Schooling options in France Colony are also severely limited. Nearby schools never give admission to the children from the colony and so they are forced to rely on charities, mostly those run by Christians. Rashida Bibi, a resident of the slum area, says that her daughter attends the Khatoon-e-Fatima School, a Catholic school run by nuns, and gets there courtesy a free bus service provided to France Colony children by NGO FemAid.

Meanwhile, the school set-up by the Masihi Foundation is the only functioning school in the colony. Unlike the other schools opened by the foundation in Quetta, where both Christians and non-Christians are enrolled, the France Colony school seems destined to be limited only to this minority.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 15th,  2011.]]>
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			<title>Jinnah’s vision of Pakistan</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/231323/jinnah%e2%80%99s-vision-of-pakistan</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/231323/jinnah%e2%80%99s-vision-of-pakistan#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sun, 14 Aug 11 15:21:41 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[rasul.bakhsh.rais]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=231323</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[In a nutshell, Jinnah wanted citizenship not religion as the founding principle of the new state.]]>
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				<![CDATA[What Jinnah envisioned for Pakistan as a state remains a distant dream. We continue to grope in darkness for a constitutional state based on equal rights and separation of religion from the state. But we have walked slowly and steadily in the opposite direction.

Let us clear some of the fog about Jinnah’s vision of Pakistan first. I believe Jinnah’s speech before the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on August 11, 1947, is unambiguous about what kind of ideas of state and nation-building our great leader had in mind. In a nutshell, he wanted citizenship not religion as the founding principle of the new state. His frequently quoted parts of the speech, “You may belong to any religion or caste or creed — that has nothing to do with the business of the state” is neither understood in terms of the context nor for the selection of the expression.

Contextual interpretation is extremely important for any great speech or analysis, undertaken by historians and later-day commentators to explain the intent of great leaders. For the context, Pakistan was only three days away from achieving independence. Secondly, the forum was the Constituent Assembly of the new state, tasked with the responsibility of framing a new constitution.

Jinnah, like many other Muslim leaders of the subcontinent who strived for the creation of a new state comprising the Muslim majority areas, was a modernist. The three streams of philosophy that influenced movement for Pakistan, unfortunately, got pushed back with the second generation of Pakistani leaders — constitutional struggle for the protection of minority rights, modernism and a territorial state. Let us spell these ideas in some detail.

The cultural roots of minority Muslim nationalism go back many centuries. Over time, Muslims developed a deep sense of identity but within the Indian context. As the issues of representation in the elected assemblies and state institutions under colonial rule emerged important for all communities, the Muslim community began to raise demands for proportionate representation. The community thought it was their right to do so, which was, on occasion, granted through separate electorates. As the Muslims and other parts of the Indian nation struggled for independence, the constitutional protection of rights in the post-colonial, unified state emerged as the defining issue for the Muslims. They wanted it to be settled before the English left; it was the collective failure of the British, Congress and the Muslim League that galvanised the demand for Pakistan. What we have done with our own religious minorities after independence is another story — truly heartbreaking.

There is a social and political category all over the world called the modernists that we also find among the dreamers and founders of Pakistan. The modernists don’t reject the past, or the heritage in cultural and religious spheres. They essentially live in modern times and propose and implement solutions to the contemporary problems of the society on rational, pragmatic and practical grounds.

Pakistan, in my view, is a territorial state. Its acronym is drawn from the territorial domains it contains. It also means that all citizens of all faiths, sects and religious pursuits are equal citizens. These are the founding ideas of Pakistan, which the successive generations of Pakistanis have lost.

The counter-narratives about the creation of Pakistan and what kind of state and society we should have replaced our founding ideas. It was expedient for the ruling groups to play an emotional Islamic card in politics rather than build a modern, nation state based on equal citizenship. Doing so would have required democracy and constitutionalism that our ruling classes have accepted only as conveniences and not as ideology — the ideology of Jinnah.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 15th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights, equality assured after devolution: Zardari</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/229355/minority-rights-equality-assured-after-devolution-zardari</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/229355/minority-rights-equality-assured-after-devolution-zardari#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Thu, 11 Aug 11 14:16:01 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
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			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=229355</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[President said the recognition and respect for the minorities rights is part of the PPP manifesto.]]>
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				<![CDATA[President Asif Ali Zardari has said that the government stands committed to ensure equal rights for minorities as enshrined in the Constitution and the UN Declaration of Human Rights.

In a message on Minorities Day, the President said the recognition and respect for the minorities rights is part of the Pakistan Peoples Party’s manifesto. He said it is an occasion to recognize the important role, played by the minorities of Pakistan in nation-building, the sacrifices rendered by them, and the problems and issues, faced by members of minorities.

He said it was the day to renew the commitment to protect their rights and to draw them fully in the mainstream of national life.

President Zardari said Islam and indeed all true religions, stress higher values like equality, social justice and respect for human rights.

He said Islam lays special emphasis on equal and just treatment of the disadvantaged and the minorities.

The President said August 11 also has a special significance in the national calendar. He mentioned that it was on this day in 1947 when the Father of the Nation, Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, in his historic speech to the members of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan, had laid down the foundations of a modern, tolerant and progressive Pakistan in which every one will have equal rights, regardless of creed, caste and gender.

He said that speech of the Quaid-e-Azam marks the state policy towards minorities, rooted in the freedom to every one to profess his religious beliefs freely and without fear or interference.

President Zardari expressed the confidence that after passage of 18th Amendment, the provincial governments will continue to ensure equality, freedom and security for all communities so that they can freely profess and practise their religions and also safeguard their legitimate and rightful interests.

He said Minorities Day was an opportunity that reminds to reaffirm solidarity for the betterment of humanity and for a prosperous Pakistan.

&nbsp;]]>
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			<title>Rape, mutilation: Pakistan's tribal justice for women</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/227443/rape-mutilation-pakistans-tribal-justice-for-women</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/227443/rape-mutilation-pakistans-tribal-justice-for-women#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 09 Aug 11 05:11:08 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[reuters]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=227443</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Pakistan's tribal justice system is instinctively unsympathetic to women.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[On April 14, two men entered Asma Firdous' home, cut off six of her fingers, slashed her arms and lips and then sliced off her nose. Before leaving the house, the men locked their 28-year-old victim inside.

Asma, from impoverished Kohaur Junobi village in Pakistan's south, was mutilated because her husband was involved in a dispute with his relatives, and they wanted revenge. Her fate is familiar in parts of Pakistan's remote and feudal agricultural belts, where women are often used as bargaining chips in family feuds, and where the level of violence they face is increasing in frequency and brutality.

At the hospital in a nearby Multan town, Asma's shocked parents sat quietly by her bedside and struggled to explain what the future holds for their now disfigured daughter. "I don't know what will happen to her when she leaves here," Asma's father, Ghulam Mustafa, said, in a dilapidated ward heavy with the smell of antiseptic and blood, where other women, doused with acid or kerosene by relatives or fellow villagers, awaited an equally uncertain future. Asked if Asma will return to her husband, her father remains silent.

(Read: Plight of Pakistani women)

Pakistan is the world's third-most dangerous country for women, after Afghanistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo,based on a survey conducted by the Thomson Reuters Foundation. In its 2010 report, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said almost 800 women were victims of "honour killings" --murders aimed at preserving the honour of male relatives -- and 2,900 women reported raped -- almost eight a day. The bulk, or almost 2,600, were raped in Punjab alone,Pakistan's most populous province.

And the numbers are rising: media reports say crimes against women have risen 18 percent in the year to May and the HRC believes its figures represent only a fraction of the attacks which take place across the country.

Dr. Farzana Bari, director of Gender Studies at Quaid-e-AzamUniversity, says Pakistan's patriarchal society often condones discrimination against women, which is more prevalent among poor and uneducated rural families.

That mindset can often influence the police and judiciary, which sometimes turn a blind eye to honour killings or rapes carried out to "punish" women.  "I think honour killings are a symptom of vigilante justice,"  she said. And vigilante justice occurs in anenvironment where the state is unable to enforce its writ."

Tribal justice

In rural areas, women are often shut out of the justice system, which is compromised by powerful landowners and feudal lords who dominate a hierarchy that makes it difficult -- and deadly -- for those with little education or social standing to speak out. Families or tribes then often take justice in their own hands, presiding over "jirgas" or "panchayats" -- gatherings of elders that hand down punishments that include rape, killing or barter of women for crimes that include falling in love with a man deemed inappropriate or besmirching family honour. Some women are maimed just to settle scores.

Members of the panchayat systems say the tradition is hard to shake because it is entrenched in the local culture and also because it is much more efficient than the regular courts. "In the settled areas there are courts but people can't always get justice or compensation," said lawyer and tribal elder Karim Masoud, who presides over both panchayat settlements and the mainstream court system. "With the jirgas, they can get compensation, and it takes less time to settle a dispute. It's fairer and people don't have to use bribes to get justice."

Zarmuhamad Afridi, who also attends jirga rulings in Pakistan's northern tribal belt and works within the mainstream court system, said the jirga system survives because in many parts of Pakistan, a man's honour is intrinsically linked to how his wife or daughter behave.  "If a couple is not married and they are having a relationship, a jirga may rule that the woman should be shot," Afridi said. "That is okay for many, because they have to protect family honour."

The slightest transgression by a woman -- being seen talking to a man on the street, perhaps, or having an unknown phone number in a mobile -- can bring harsh punishment and social ostracism of the family, he says, making the quick, harsh judgment of the panchayats popular. "Women are cherished here," he said. "Men protect them. If a woman is out of her house then what is she doing? That is what people think here."

Many women are unable to speak out because they lack the support and education to understand their rights, activists say.  But even those who dare often get nowhere. The most high profile instance of a violent ruling by a tribal court against a woman is that of the gang rape of Mukhtaran Mai, which took place near Multan in 2002. Mai was allegedly attacked to settle a matter of village honor, as decided by a panchayat. She was then paraded naked through her village.

Unlike most rape victims, who face stark recriminations for speaking out, and who are sometimes even expected to commit suicide, she filed a criminal case against 14 men. Six men were convicted and sentenced to death that year, but in 2005 the Lahore High Court commuted one sentence to life in prison and acquitted the rest.	    Pakistan's Supreme Court upheld that decision in April this year, in what rights activists said was a crushing blow towomen's and minority rights in Pakistan. The men were released days later. Mai said she is afraid they will return and kill her.

Ali Dayan Hasan, senior researcher at Human Rights Watch's South Asia division, said the lack of justice for women in cases like such as Mai's is "a structural failing of the criminal justice system". "The verdict also lays bare the misogyny of Pakistan's judicial system because it is a judiciary that is instinctively unsympathetic to women."

&nbsp;]]>
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			<title>Flood rehabilitation: Govt scheme only allots land to Muslims</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/223705/flood-rehabilitation-govt-scheme-only-allots-land-to-muslims</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/223705/flood-rehabilitation-govt-scheme-only-allots-land-to-muslims#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Thu, 04 Aug 11 05:47:50 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[ali.usman]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=223705</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Residents say Punjab government has not kept the constitutional quota for minorities.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Hameed Masih and all other non-Muslims in Kot Addu, who lost their houses in the floods last year, remain homeless despite a scheme by the Punjab government to allocate land to residents in the area.


Hameed says the provincial government has not set a quota for members of minority communities, who were left homeless by the devastating floods.

The government has launched four schemes in Kot Addu under which around 435 plots of 5-marlas (151 square yards) each are to be distributed among people who lost their property in the floods. Several people were allotted land last month and so far, no minority member has been given land.

“Christians in this area are not rich people. They lost their houses and lands in the floods and should have been given five per cent quota in the scheme. Flood victims could have been easily accommodated, but the quota system has not been followed because of which no minority member has been allotted land,” Hameed told The Express Tribune.

“The aid distribution was fair.  There were some problems in the beginning but then minority members protested and the issue was resolved,” he said. Hameed said Christian families in his village are receiving monthly stipends through Watan Cards. “The list of homeless people was prepared by local patwaris [land revenue officers] who were not fair in doing their job,” said another Christian.

Sarwar Masiih said he does not have property and does menial work for a living, but his name was not included in the list by the patwari. “Patwaris had to refer our names to higher authorities, but the names of those who could not make them “happy” were not included in the list. My name was not in the list so I had no hope of getting land, though being homeless I fulfill the criteria,” he said.

The areas where plots have been allotted include Gurmani Sharki, Jandeer Dueaja, Chak 568 and Chowk Sarwar Shaheed. There are some 8,500 registered voters of minorities, mostly Christians and Hindus, in the area. The population of minorities in these areas is said to be around 18,000.

“This is not a case of discrimination, but bad management. Several people, who have been allotted plots under this scheme, already have plenty of resources and land, while those who do not have property have been ignored,” said Wasim, a Christian by faith and minorities coordinator of Kot Addu.

There is one person who owns 22 acres of agricultural land, but has been allotted land under the scheme,” he said.

Napoleon Qayyum, a minority rights activist, said that under the constitution, minorities should be given five per cent quota in all schemes launched by the government, adding that the Punjab government should adhere to that.

Officials from the local administration responded to the allegations by saying they did not directly have anything to do with flood rehabilitation, adding that plots were allotted to homeless people through a lucky draw.

Chaudhary Ehsanul Haq Nolatia, a local MPA from Kot Addu said:  “A committee was formed to look into the allotment. It is true that the government did not allocate any special quota for minorities in the scheme, but the plots were distributed through a draw. However, I will take up this issue in the Punjab Assembly.”

Published in The Express Tribune, August 4th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: For the groups with already small numbers, a further marginalisation in parliament</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/222846/minority-rights-for-the-groups-with-already-small-numbers-a-further-marginalisation-in-parliament</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/222846/minority-rights-for-the-groups-with-already-small-numbers-a-further-marginalisation-in-parliament#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 02 Aug 11 20:49:06 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[z.ali]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=222846</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Pakistan’s Hindus, Parsis don’t even have marriage laws.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Many of the minorities in Pakistan, which include Hindus, Sikhs, Christians and Parsis, are unhappy with the people who are supposed to fight for their rights in parliament and see through laws that govern their communities.


On Sunday, a conference was called by the Hindu Panchayat to discuss a 16-point agenda. The fact that only one elected representative, MNA Krishan Chand Parwani, bothered to turn up, disgusted the other people who had gathered there. “The absence of minority legislators in this conference testifies to our claims,” remarked Jai Kumar Dhirani, the Panchayat’s patron.

At the heart of the matter is devolution, a decision which has also affected the workings of the Evacuee Trust Property Board. “After the 18th amendment [was passed], the minority ministry, including the Evacuee trust, were to be devolved to the provinces,” said Advocate M Prakash, a member of the board. “But the federal government handed them over to the human rights ministry instead.”

The trust looks after the properties and buildings left behind by minorities who were evacuated from Pakistan after 1947. Prakash pointed out faults with its 16-member board, which is selected by the prime minister. It hardly makes sense for it to have 11 Muslims but only three Christians, one Hindu and a Sikh as its members.

Another area where the numbers are skewed is the actual house of representatives. Even though Pakistan has more scheduled caste Hindus, their elected representatives are mostly upper-class Hindus, pointed out Dr Taek Chand.

“It is easier for us to approach Muslim ministers than the inaccessible minority members of parliament,” remarked Advocate Kalpana Devi, an outspoken activist of Hindu rights. She pointed out that their “self-styled” minority leaders don’t even know that Hindus have no laws to their marriages and property.

The entire process of choosing a minority MPA, MNA or senator is marked by “briefcases [bribes], nepotism and likes and dislikes”, said Wasandas Bhaagri, a leader of the Bhaagri caste. He alleged that the minority MPAs spend more time seeking permits for liquor shops, petrol pumps and tenders rather than working for their communities. “Two million rupees, earmarked for the welfare of minorities, were wasted due to their lack of concern,” added Father Daniel Fayyaz, a Catholic priest.

Patiently listening to this was the general secretary of the Pakistan Peoples Party, Taj Hyder. “I had proposed the right for minorities to elect their representatives by means of multiple-member constituencies while we were doing the spadework for the 18th constitutional amendment,” he said.

He regretted that their efforts to get support from parliamentarians for Hindu marriage and property registration laws had gone in vain. “We drafted a law and held 12 consultation sessions to inform the lawmakers about it,” he said. But when it seemed that the law would go through parliament, the minority ministry was devolved by the 18th amendment, he recalled.

Understandably, there is bitterness. Father Fayaz said that the crescent and the star in the Pakistani flag were symbolic of the minorities. But if the government doesn’t want to address our problems, then it should remove them from the flag, he said.

The conference was also attended by Jai Prakash, a minister of Balochistan, MPA Nusrat Sehar Abbassi, the PML-N’s Hanif Siddiqui, Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam’s Taj Muhammad Nahiyon and the president of the Hyderabad division of the Jamaat-e-Islami, Shaikh Shoukat.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 3rd, 2011.]]>
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			<title>New office : US plans ME religious rights envoy</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/221046/new-office-us-plans-me-religious-rights-envoy</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/221046/new-office-us-plans-me-religious-rights-envoy#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sun, 31 Jul 11 12:17:29 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[afp]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=221046</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[The envoy will be tasked with pressing minority rights in a broad region covering the Arab world, Central Asia.]]>
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				<![CDATA[The US House of Representatives has voted to establish a US envoy to protect the rights of religious minorities in the Middle East and South Asia, amid rising concern over Egypt, Iraq and Pakistan. While a marathon debate continued Friday on how to avoid US debt default, the House voted 402 to 20 to require President Barack Obama to set up the envoy post. The Senate must follow suit, but senators from both parties have voiced support. The envoy will be tasked with pressing minority rights in a broad region covering the Arab world, Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent. But the bill asks the envoy to prioritize Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 31th,  2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: Dalits want greater share in census over upper caste Hindus</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/217136/minority-rights-dalits-want-greater-share-in-census-over-upper-caste-hindus</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/217136/minority-rights-dalits-want-greater-share-in-census-over-upper-caste-hindus#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Mon, 25 Jul 11 20:30:16 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[express]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=217136</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[They feel their own community is discriminating against them.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Pakistan’s scheduled caste minorities, or Dalits, have expressed serious concern over discrimination against them, such as organised attempts to portray their numbers as less than they are in the upcoming census.


Dalit representatives spoke at a meeting of the Pakistan Dalit Solidarity Network held at the Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research (Piler). Dr Sono Khangharani from the Thardeep Rural Development Programme, Karamat Ali and Zulfiqar Shah from Piler, Avinash Hari from the Upgrade Minorities for Integrated Development, chairman of the Scheduled Caste Rights Movement Pakistan Ramesh Jaipal and other dalit organisation leaders participated.

They claimed that political parties are giving reserved minority seats in the assembly to upper caste Hindus only. But this is hardly representative as the population of the scheduled castes is much higher than that of the upper caste Hindus, they added.

They also fear that the ratio of Dalits in the minorities will be reduced further as many of them include themselves in the Hindu category even though the religion column includes a separate category for the scheduled caste. The participants stressed the need for Dalit families to be aware of the fact that they can register under this category in the census.

There are an estimated two million Dalits living in Pakistan today. The gathering demanded that their shares in employment, scholarships, national resources, development schemes and parliament be raised based on their numbers.

Other issues such as forced labour, forced conversion to Islam and illegal occupation of religious places of minorities were also discussed at length. PRESS RELEASE

Published in The Express Tribune, July 26th,  2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority issues: PHRF rallies against violation of rights</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/216677/minority-issues-phrf-rallies-against-violation-of-rights</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/216677/minority-issues-phrf-rallies-against-violation-of-rights#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Mon, 25 Jul 11 14:06:45 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[ppi]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=216677</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Human rights activists condemned the fact that minority communities were not living in secure conditions.]]>
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				<![CDATA[A demonstration against the violation of minority rights was organised on Sunday by the Pakistan Human Rights Forum (PHRF) at the press club. Human rights activists, including PHRF chairperson Mehboob Sangi, condemned the fact that minority communities were not living in secure conditions. They also condemned the illegal occupation of their properties.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 25th,  2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: 10 temples renovated</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/216794/minority-rights-10-temples-renovated</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/216794/minority-rights-10-temples-renovated#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Mon, 25 Jul 11 14:03:44 +0500</pubDate>
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				<![CDATA[The names of a few famous mandirs that have been renovated are Katas Raj Mandir and Pujari room in Krishna Mandir.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Rehabilitation and repair work of ten mandirs in various cities across Pakistan have been completed by the government as part of a welfare programme for minorities in the country. The names of a few famous mandirs that have been renovated are Katas Raj Mandir, Pujari room in Krishna Mandir, Lahore, Mandir Sadhu Bela, Jholay Lal Mandir, Gurpat Mandir Siro Ghat, Bhagat Ram Mandir, Sant Thawar Das Mandir and Krishna Mandir.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 25th,  2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: HRCP condemns barring of Sikhs from temple</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/213427/minority-rights-hrcp-condemns-barring-of-sikhs-from-temple</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/213427/minority-rights-hrcp-condemns-barring-of-sikhs-from-temple#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 20 Jul 11 05:34:39 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[express]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=213427</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Asma Jahangir has strongly urged Punjab govt and the provincial chief minister to take prompt notice of the incident.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Barring of Sikhs from a gurudwara in Lahore is scandalous and a violation of fundamental rights, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) has said.


In a statement released on Tuesday, the HRCP said: “While extremist elements barring religious minorities from their worship places in Pakistan no longer surprises anyone,” the authority’s decision is “scandalous”.

Around four years ago, a group of young Muslim men had claimed that the gurudwara was built on the site of the burial place of a Muslim saint. The Evacuee Trust Property Board had allowed both communities to observe their religious rituals according to their own beliefs at the gurudwara. But, on July 16, police deployed outside the gurudwara prevented the Sikhs from congregating to commemorate an eighteenth-century saint because Shab-e-Barat was to be observed two days later.

“Police deployment to prevent the congregation at the gurudwara was shocking, ill-advised and entirely uncalled for,” the statement says. The governing authority has “no right to ask members of a religious faith to postpone rituals of their faith inside their places of worship or to give precedence to religious rituals of one faith over another.”

Meanwhile, President of the Supreme Court Bar Association Asma Jahangir has strongly urged the Punjab government and the provincial chief minister to take prompt notice of the incident.

“The Quaid-e-Azam stressed on the rights of minorities and all minorities in Pakistan have the right to exercise religious freedom,” said Jahangir. “The historical temple has been in place for over a century and the Sikh community has been practising their religious rights here.”

Published in The Express Tribune, July 20th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: ‘Jobs to be provided according to quota’</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/210144/minority-rights-%e2%80%98jobs-to-be-provided-according-to-quota%e2%80%99</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/210144/minority-rights-%e2%80%98jobs-to-be-provided-according-to-quota%e2%80%99#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Fri, 15 Jul 11 03:10:53 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=210144</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[jobs should also be given to eligible candidates belonging to minorities on merit according to their sanctioned quota]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif directed all government departments and other autonomous bodies on Thursday to provide jobs to minorities in accordance with the quota granted to them, Minister for Human Rights and Minorities Punjab Kamran Michael said while talking to APP on Thursday. Michael said that the chief minister had issued directives to all the administrative secretaries, heads of attached departments and organisations in the province that during the process of recruitment, jobs should also be given to eligible candidates belonging to minorities on merit according to their sanctioned quota.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 15th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: NADRA ordered to register Sikh marriages</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/203443/minority-rights-nadra-ordered-to-register-sikh-marriages</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/203443/minority-rights-nadra-ordered-to-register-sikh-marriages#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 06 Jul 11 03:46:55 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[express]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=203443</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[The authority will verify marriage certificates from Pakistan Sikh Council, Gurdwara.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[The government has directed the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) to register marriages of the Sikh community.


To start the registration process, chairman of the Pakistan Sikh Council Sardar Ramesh Singh met NADRA Deputy Chairman Tariq Malik.

“NADRA will consider ‘Annand Karraj’ as the marriage certificate issued by Gurdwaras for verifying Sikh marriages,” a senior official told The Express Tribune. The authority will verify certificates from the respective Gurdwara as well as the Sikh council, confirmed a statement issued by the NADRA office.

“NADRA is strictly following the government’s policy that minorities should not be discriminated against on the basis of religion or sect,” Malik said.

Singh acknowledged the efforts of NADRA to register minorities in the national database.

The deputy chairman informed the delegation that NADRA has registered a total 5,852 Sikhs so far, including 3,105 men and 2,747 women.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 6th, 2011.

&nbsp;]]>
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			<title>People’s forum: The freedom that is lost in gunfire</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/202503/people%e2%80%99s-forum-the-freedom-that-is-lost-in-gunfire</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/202503/people%e2%80%99s-forum-the-freedom-that-is-lost-in-gunfire#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 05 Jul 11 01:02:06 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[nishaa.ishtiak]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=202503</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Sungi’s ‘awami assembly’ raises important questions regarding national sovereignty and army’s accountability.]]>
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				<![CDATA[With memories of stealth helicopters circling over the city still fresh in the minds of locals, speakers and participants questioned the ability of the state to exercise sovereignty, the role of the military, and the relationship between civil and military institutions.


“When institutions forget their purpose and lose a sense of direction, catastrophes such as the killings in Balochistan occur,” said defence analyst Ayesha Siddiqa during the second session of the three-day Omar Asghar Khan awami (people’s) assembly, organised by Sungi Foundation on June 2.

Siddiqa opened the forum by questioning the prevailing situation in the country. “There is a gap between our security apparatus and the government because our military institutions have forgotten who they serve.”

She said, “It is very interesting to raise the question of sovereignty in Abbottabad, which recently saw it being shred to pieces in the Osama bin Laden operation.”

She was of the view that the reason behind violation of national sovereignty and the unwarranted presence of non-state actors within our national boundaries is the lack of accountability on the part of our military institutes.  “Armies are not supposed to go around killing their own people; it is up to us to make it abide by the will of the people.”

She said that while we are quick to criticise the US, we don’t question the fact that our own services are for sale. Siddiqa said Jinnah had reflected decades ago that the Western powers will require our help due to our geo-strategic environment.

However, she continued, making use of this strategic location was and is at our own discretion. Furthermore, challenges to our sovereignty will not end with America’s departure from the region, “The more important question regarding sovereignty is what will happen after the Americans leave?” she added.

Sungi Program Director Asad Rehman spoke on the theme of “Internal and external threats: myths and realities”.

He said it is common knowledge that 60 per cent of the budget is allocated to the army and external debt servicing. Rehman asked people to contemplate over glaring questions such as why the majority of external debt has been taken on by military governments.

He said our military strategy is too India-centric, and that we hardly engage in deliberations and lack a resolute approach. Rehman claimed that the public have a responsibility to question institutions, as they represent the people.

Later in the evening, a cultural evening was also organised by Sungi at Shimla Hill, where Sheema Kermani performed. The participants including social activists, government officials, media officials and Sungi’s local partners.

A resolution was passed on the third day of the assembly; participants committed themselves to work for promoting peace and harmony as well as building pressure groups to improve security and the law and order situation, control agencies and to provide support to the Balochi cause.

Other eminent speakers included Rakshanda Parveen, Rumana Bashir, Zafarullah Khan, Mazar Arif and Bushra  Gohar, who spoke on the state of women and youth, role of media in promoting peace and security and the protection of minority rights. 

Published in The Express Tribune, July 5th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority Rights: ‘Hinduism should be an option in census’</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/188317/minority-rights-%e2%80%98hinduism-should-be-an-option-in-census%e2%80%99</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/188317/minority-rights-%e2%80%98hinduism-should-be-an-option-in-census%e2%80%99#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 14 Jun 11 12:27:15 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[express]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=188317</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Laws should also be enacted for the registration of marriages of scheduled caste Hindus, he added.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[Hinduism should be listed as an option under the question of religion in the census, demanded the Scheduled Castes Rights Movement of Pakistan on Monday. They said Hinduism should replace the option of ‘scheduled castes’ in the census form. The movement’s Ramesh Lal also pointed out that according to the Scheduled Castes Act, 1957, there was a quota of six per cent for Hindus. However, it was never implemented. Laws should also be enacted for the registration of marriages of scheduled caste Hindus, he added.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, June 14th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights: For Hindu community, asylum may be the only option</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/186683/minority-rights-for-hindu-community-asylum-may-be-the-only-option</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/186683/minority-rights-for-hindu-community-asylum-may-be-the-only-option#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sat, 11 Jun 11 04:53:37 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[nadir.hassan]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=186683</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Balochistan becoming increasingly unsafe for minorities.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[Tausiq Kumar begins his day with a cup of tea and a phone call to the Indian High Commission in Islamabad. A trader by profession and hailing from the Patel Bagh area of Quetta, Kumar applied for asylum in India after his relative Ramesh was murdered for resisting a kidnapping attempt on February 6.


Even before Ramesh’s killing, says Kumar, there was a palpable fear among the beleaguered Hindu community in Balochistan. He traces the insecurity among 27,000-strong Hindu community as having started only in the last few years and painfully points out that Hindus have generally had their rights respected in the province, even after the Babri Masjid was destroyed in India in 1992.

Ramesh’s killing was the final straw that convinced Kumar he would be better off moving to India. He says, “I first became scared when a priest Maharaj Laxmichand Gujri was kidnapped and never found. He was highly respected in our community and after that we couldn’t ignore what was happening.”

After his relative’s murder, Kumar got in touch with the Indian High Commission, filed his application and waited. A couple of months passed by and he didn’t hear back. So, he decided to come to Islamabad and is now living in a guest house trying to expedite the process. Kumar knows of five people from the town of Mastang, close to Quetta, who have already migrated to India and is hopeful he will be able to move soon.

Although statistics are hard to come by, Saeed Ahmed Khan, the Balochistan director for the federal human rights ministry, says that he knows of more than two dozen Hindu families that are looking to migrate from Balochistan.

Quetta-based journalist Abdul Wahab says that at least 43 Hindus have been kidnapped in Balochistan in the last three years, three of whom were later found dead. He adds that whenever the provincial assembly has debated the issue, parliamentarians have either taken a head-in-the-sand approach to the issue or blamed the intelligence agencies for the kidnappings and killings.

Kumar says Hindus felt safer when Akbar Bugti was alive because he provided religious minorities the protection they needed. He also says that Hindus generally felt safer in the Baloch areas of the province as opposed to the Pakhtun areas.

Now Kumar is spending his meagre earnings in Islamabad trying to leave the country as soon as possible. He says, “I considered moving to a safer part of the country but I don’t know if there is any safe part. I am not sure if it is just criminals who kidnap Hindus for ransom or a hatred for Hindus but I am not safe here.”

 

 

Published in The Express Tribune, June 11th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Mud huts and evictions: ‘Residential security is having housing, not land’</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/176864/mud-huts-and-evictions-%e2%80%98residential-security-is-having-housing-not-land%e2%80%99</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/176864/mud-huts-and-evictions-%e2%80%98residential-security-is-having-housing-not-land%e2%80%99#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Thu, 26 May 11 22:40:27 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[express]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=176864</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Housing for the poor first, development later, say speakers.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[Have you ever wondered why people build mud houses instead of permanent ones in the rural areas? One of the main reasons is that they fear being evicted. At any time, a landlord can kick them out and they would have to rebuild all over again.


“A majority of our agriculture-related population does not own land. They live on the piece of land provided by the landowner who has discretionary powers to evict them on a whim,” explained Prof. Dr Pervez Pathan, who was presenting at a seminar on ‘Residential Land Rights in Sindh’ organised by the Institute for Social Movement and Oxfam GB on Thursday. “Residential security is seen as access to land rather than housing.”

Pathan, who is the director of the Sindh Development Studies Centre at the University of Sindh, Jamshoro, explained that tribes, castes, ethnic and religious identities also stop people from acquiring land for housing.

Residential land is defined as an area predominantly used for housing. Residential rights, on the other hand, suggest the right of a dweller to the land they occupy for accommodation. Then why is it, asked Dr Pathan, that “housing policies and laws are not explicitly based on the human rights provisions in the Constitution”. Laws should define what the standards are of adequate housing, basic services and social security. The government should make it illegal to forcefully evict someone.

Oxfam GB’s Fatima Naqvi pointed out that civil society has time until the next general elections to press political parties to pursue this agenda and mobilise popular support.

According to the Constitution, housing should be provided to all citizens, including those “who are unable to earn a livelihood”.

Activist Zulfiqar Halepoto noted that the issue is as relevant to urban areas as it is to rural ones. “A few years ago, when we were fighting against the Left Bank Outfall Drainage (LBOD) project in rural Sindh, there was a protest movement against the Lyari Expressway in Karachi as people feared losing their houses.”

Halepoto maintained that during the past six to eight years, scores of villages that had inhabited Karachi for centuries were pulled down to construct plazas. “No one is against development but it should not be at the expense of making people homeless.” He believes that unlike Hyderabad, Karachi cannot expand horizontally.

Talking about the minority rights, advocate M Prakash said that Hindus, especially those belonging to the lower stratum of society, are the biggest sufferers. “Most of the gypsies are Bheels, Kolhis and Menghwadhs,” he said referring to landless Hindus.

Zulfiqar Shah of the Institute of Social Movement announced that his organisation in collaboration with other groups would lead a march to the Sindh Assembly in June to press for housing rights of the indigenous people of Sindh.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, May 27th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>U.S. deepens engagement with Afghan Taliban: report</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/170499/u-s-deepens-engagement-with-afghan-taliban-report</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/170499/u-s-deepens-engagement-with-afghan-taliban-report#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 17 May 11 15:52:12 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[reuters]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=170499</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[The U.S. and Afghan governments want the Taliban to end all violence and to observe the Afghan constitution.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[The United States had stepped up direct talks with the Afghan Taliban for a political settlement of the 10-year-old war, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday.

A move that analysts said earlier was easier following the death of Osama bin Laden. A U.S. representative attended at least three meetings in Qatar and Germany, including one eight or nine days ago with a Taliban official considered close to the group's leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, the report said, citing an Afghan official.

The United States had stepped up direct talks with the Afghan Taliban for a political settlement of the 10-year-old war, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday.

A move that analysts said earlier was easier following the death of Osama bin Laden. A U.S. representative attended at least three meetings in Qatar and Germany, including one eight or nine days ago with a Taliban official considered close to the group's leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, the report said, citing an Afghan official.

It said that Washington was hoping to make progress in these talks before July, when President Barack Obama announces the first troop withdrawals from Afghanistan, part of a process of handing over responsibilities to Afghan forces by 2014.

The report about the talks comes more than two weeks after the death of Bin Laden at the hands of U.S. special forces in Pakistan, which analysts said helped clear the path for a political settlement in Afghanistan by making it easier for theTaliban to sever ties with al Qaeda

The Taliban sheltered Bin Laden in Afghanistan for years, until U.S.-backed Afghan forces toppled them in 2001, unleashing a war between U.S.-led NATO forces and the Islamist group.

The Washington Post said the talks with the Taliban had taken place through non-government intermediaries and Arab and European governments. The Taliban, it said, had insisted on direct negotiations with the Americans and proposed opening a formal office, with Qatar as a possible venue.

The discussions were still preliminary. It said the Taliban had transmitted a longstanding list of demands, including the release of up to 20 fighters detained at Guantanamo Bay, a withdrawal of all foreign troops and a guarantee of a substantive Taliban role in government.

The U.S. and Afghan governments want the Taliban to end all violence and to observe the Afghan constitution, including respect for women's and minority rights and the rule of law.

The report said the discussions were being conducted with the part of the Taliban that answered to Mullah Omar or had influence in his Pakistan-based Quetta shura. It quoted officials as saying that no role had been played by the Haqqani network, a group of Afghan fighters based in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal region seen by the Obama administration as particularly brutal and irreconcilable.

The Haqqani network has had longstanding links with Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence, seen to have used the insurgent group as one of its "strategic assets" in Afghanistan.]]>
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			<title>Minority rights : Wedding invitation only proof of marriage</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/167539/minority-rights-wedding-invitation-only-proof-of-marriage</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/167539/minority-rights-wedding-invitation-only-proof-of-marriage#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Thu, 12 May 11 21:34:52 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[samia.saleem]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=167539</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Rights group highlights the hurdles faced by non-Muslim communities.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[The members of small communities settled in Pakistan are tired of being labelled ‘minorities’. Hindus, Christians, Sikhs, Baha’is and Hazarwals across the country feel that the word has marginalised them and taken away their right to be called an official Pakistani citizen.


The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) organised a series of meetings for the members of small religious groups to discuss these concerns. The third such session was held at the Regent Plaza on Thursday. A working committee, put together by HRCP in June 2010 in light of the discrimination faced by communities because of their beliefs, spoke at the meeting.

Advocate Rochiram claimed that Pakistani Hindus and the Sikhs don’t have any marriage laws. He elaborated that while courts accept proof of Christian marriages from priests, there is no such authorisation for Hindu marriages. The same goes for laws of inheritance, re-marriage, separation and adoption, he added.

Pushpa Kumari, a Hindu minority rights activist, told The Express Tribune that she is married and her daughter is at university, but as far as the law goes, she is single. “When I was going to Switzerland, the embassy asked me for my marriage certificate,” she said. “I had to dig up my wedding cards by calling distant relatives which was the only available proof except for my bindaya and mangalsutra (a thread worn by married Hindu women).”

The Sikhs face the same problems, explained Charanjeet Singh from Peshawar and Krishan Singh from Karachi.

As the focus shifted towards other communities, Munawwar Ali Shahid, an Ahmadi from Lahore, said that Ahmadis have been robbed of both religious and political rights ever since partition. Syed Muhammad Ashraf Zaidi, a Hazarwal who travelled to the meeting from Quetta, shared how his community has been brutally targeted since 1999. He said that the incidents have resulted in almost 500 deaths and 1,000 disabling injuries.

HRCP Secretary General IA Rehman assured the gathering that their organisation is working on these issues separately and in detail. He said that these communities do not need the Pakistani government to make laws for them. They can come up with solutions that cannot be challenged and suit everyone.

To resolve the issue of Hindu marriage, a committee of seven Hindu members from different Sindh districts was put together.

They are to come up with recommendations for a final draft for the Hindu marriage laws which will be forwarded to parliament.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 13th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Education and devolution</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/153102/education-and-devolution</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/153102/education-and-devolution#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 20 Apr 11 17:59:40 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[rubina.saigol]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=153102</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[The creation of Pakistani nationhood meant a move from diversity to homogeneity of our curriculum.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[The controversy over the devolution of education to the provinces reveals a deeper political conflict than issues related only to education. The underlying debate reflects an old tension between national ideology constructed by a national security state on the one hand, and multiple ideologies representing varied interests of diverse groups on the other. The control over how knowledge is created, circulated and consumed determines how populations can be tamed, contained and disciplined.

The tension between a homogenised ‘national’ curriculum and one more representative of a plural and diverse polity was discernible as early as the period of Ayub Khan, when a centralised state was being constructed. The creation of Pakistani nationhood meant a move from regionalism to nationalism, from diversity to homogeneity. Ayub Khan was eager to see education perform the function of nation-building by erasing older identities in favour of the new one that was still in infancy and too tenuous to be a reliable identity. In a speech in 1961, Ayub Khan emphasised the need “to undergo similar educational curricula… the standard of values becomes common and from that cohesion emerges national feeling”. In several of his speeches, he bemoaned the absence of homogenisation in West Pakistan and, while referring to the federating units, asserted that “these units were a serious impediment in the way of political and economic growth”.

The Report on the Commission on National Education (commonly known as the Sharif Report, 1959) fused the concepts of nationhood and citizenship with those of religion and patriotism by declaring that “the importance of creating a spirit of nationhood in all Pakistani citizens cannot be overemphasised. As a newly emergent nation, Pakistan must consolidate and develop the concept of Pakistani nationhood with particular emphasis on Islamic values. The school has a major role to play in the process, not only by training the men and women who will love and serve the nation and make sacrifices for it, but also in developing the characteristics of good neighbours, good citizens, and the patriot”. A state that was moving towards total centralisation required not only homogenisation of thought, but an identity of values through the instrumental use of religion, along with a steady supply of ‘patriotic’ citizens to support the imagined vision of a singular nation. Education was the prime instrument ideally suited for the steady supply of national sentiment, patriotic passion and religious belief — all three specially tailored to the needs of dictatorship.

Nationalism was always a contested concept, fragile and insecure from its inception. The disruption in the discourse of official nationalism came from the provinces and regional identities. The Sharif Report repeatedly denounces these forces. For example, it says: “The disruptive forces of communalism, regionalism and provincialism came to the fore in the subcontinent… After the first great surge that launched the nation, the magic was gone…. In a situation where the overriding objective is that of nation-building, and where there exist these centrifugal forces of regionalism, indiscipline and non-cooperation, the immense tasks to be accomplished can only be carried out when a strong and responsible leadership emerges”. The ruptures, from suppressed and silenced voices, in the neatly stitched fabric of the nation, are attributed to indiscipline and lack of cooperation. This, in turn, is used to justify authoritarian rule by invoking the idea of a ‘strong and responsible leadership’. Centralised education was thus made the handmaiden of authoritarian ideology and dictatorial practice.

The debate over the control of ideology resurfaced many times in Pakistan’s history, most recently in the attempt by Abid Sher Ali of the PML-N and Sardar Assef Ahmad Ali of the PPP to resist the devolution of the education ministry on various pretexts, the most disingenuous being the idea that the provinces are not equipped to handle education. Abid Sher Ali reportedly said that if the provinces were allowed the preparation of the curriculum and syllabus, it would seriously impair national identity, and said that “we don’t want to lay foundation of disharmony and cacophony”. The education minister expressed similar views in arguing that the curriculum and syllabus have to be national and unified, not provincial. These proposals, contended the minister, would be harmful for national unity if every province has its own curriculum and syllabus.

Reviving the arguments of the era of dictatorship, representatives of parliamentary parties comprising the National Assembly Standing Committee on Education recommended that the core curriculum must be uniform for the sake of national integration and cohesion. Phrases such as ‘national integration and cohesion’ are reminiscent of the Sharif Report in which they occur several times, reflecting a fear of diversity and difference. Former education minister Zubeida Jalal went to the extent of saying that “the plan to hand the education ministry to the provinces is a threat to the federation”. A fragile and insecure state fears that forbidden knowledge from below, from the subterranean realms of consciousness, might unleash the forces of dissent.

Knowledge is dangerous for knowledge is power. Those who seek to attain, retain and maintain power cannot afford to relinquish it to the suppressed and subjugated of this world as it can potentially liberate them. Local knowledge, folklore, tales, legends and the wisdom contained therein can subvert official knowledge carefully crafted in government bureaucracies to produce a docile and subservient citizenry.

To counter the ideologies packaged and disseminated by a national security state obsessed with India, war and enmity, it is imperative to devolve education. This would wean knowledge away from serving the ends of the security state and simultaneously recognise the diversity and pluralism inherent in society. One caveat is that while framing the curriculum the provinces must adhere to the fundamental rights granted in the constitution so that women’s rights and minority rights may be upheld. Secondly, it is important to base the curriculum objectives on pedagogical needs to serve the ends of learning, rather than on the political or ideological imperatives of the ruling elite.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 21st, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Federal minister for minorities : Christians put forward Michael Javed’s name</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/143544/federal-minister-for-minorities-christians-put-forward-michael-javed%e2%80%99s-name</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/143544/federal-minister-for-minorities-christians-put-forward-michael-javed%e2%80%99s-name#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 05 Apr 11 18:48:16 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[z.ali]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=143544</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Says they will feel insecure till they are represented in the National Assembly.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[Christian leaders in Hyderabad have nominated a candidate to fill the post of the federal minister for minorities, a chair that fell vacant when Shahbaz Bhatti was assassinated in March this year.


They include the Minority Rights Council’s M Prakash, All Pakistan Minorities Alliance’s Riaz Nazir, Bishop Younis Gul of the United Baptist Church of Pakistan and Pastor Amjad Imtiaz Khan of the Churches Council, Sindh. They held a press conference on Tuesday and put forward Michael Javed’s name for the post. They said the Christians in Pakistan have been feeling insecure since Bhatti was killed and they need to be represented properly in the “corridors of power”.

On March 6, 2011, the Election Commission had declared the candidature of Michael Javed successful on the vacant seat of the late Shahbaz Bhatti under Article 224 (6) of the Constitution.

According to them, Javed’s name was third on the list of candidates submitted by the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) to the Election Commission in November 2007, right after Shahbaz Bhatti and Senator Dr Khatu Mal Jeewan.

Ten seats are reserved for minorities in the National Assembly, apart from the 60 reserved for female candidates.

“Dr Khatu Mal was elected a senator by the PPP, therefore, by virtue of the priority list, Michael Javed is the next candidate,” they said. The Christian representatives also produced a copy of a letter written by Senator Mal Jeewan, which was addressed to the secretary of the Election Commission.

Jeewan’s letter reads: “My name occurred next in the list for non-Muslim candidates to be elected for the seats reserved for non-Muslims, in accordance with the provisions of Article 51 of the Constitution.

Since I have been asked to convey my intention regarding the retaining of the seat, I hereby intimate that I would retain seat as Member of Senate of Pakistan, as desired by my party leadership”.

Senator Jeewan was elected a senator on the general seats from Sindh in February 2009.

The Joint Christian Action Committee has appealed to the president, the prime minister, the Election Commission and the chief justice of the Supreme Court to take notice of the matter and to ensure that an official notification nominating Michael Javed as member of the National Assembly on reserved minority seats is issued soon.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 6th,  2011.]]>
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			<title>Christian village sees rising tensions</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/131533/pakistan-christian-village-sees-rising-tensions</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/131533/pakistan-christian-village-sees-rising-tensions#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sat, 12 Mar 11 07:38:07 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[afp]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=131533</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Christians say they are feeling more insecure after the assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[In the Pakistani Christian hamlet that buried its most famous resident last week - the assassinated minister for minorities, Shahbaz Bhatti - locals say religious intolerance is giving way to rising tensions.

Khushpur village has been a base for the struggle against religious suppression for more than a century and remains a rare example of Muslims and Christians in rural Pakistan living harmoniously alongside one another.

But since the killings this year of two senior politicians who spoke out against strict Islamic blasphemy laws, the tiny Christian community that forms part of the country's three per cent non-Muslim population is feeling increasingly insecure.

"My best friend Aamir is Muslim. We studied and played together, he even goes with me to the church. But now we are scared of this increasing tension. It is killing both communities," said 22-year-old villager Shahid Samuel.

Minority affairs minister Shahbaz Bhatti, 42, an outspoken campaigner against Pakistan's Islamic blasphemy laws that carry the death penalty, was killed by Taliban militants as he left his family home in Islamabad last week.

For his funeral black flags flew atop the mud and brick houses of Khushpur, his home village, in which 150 Muslims form the minority among the 5,000-strong Christian population.

Controversy over the blasphemy law, which punishes inflammatory comments on the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), flared late last year over the case of a poor Punjabi Christian woman, Aasia Bibi, who was sentenced to death over the charge.

Bibi's defenders say that like many other victims of the law, she was wrongly prosecuted because of a petty village dispute. Bhatti defended Bibi, just like Punjab provincial governor Salman Taseer who was assassinated for the same reason in January by one of his own bodyguards.

Taseer's killer has since been feted by legions of fans -- their loud defence of the blasphemy law underscoring rising religious feeling across the country.

"This is personal enmity which is being settled under the blasphemy law and it is increasing now," said 65-year-old villager Emmanuel, wearing a blue turban and holding a hookah waterpipe. "We Christians and Muslims never thought in the past that these things would create distance between us. This has really increased tension among the communities which is not good for the country and our society."

Muhammad Ghufran Arshad, a Muslim man from Khushpur who dug the graves for Bhatti and the rest of his family, said that until the minister's death he had never heard of Bibi.

"We are living together in this village since childhood. We respect them and help them in all affairs of life," he said.

Muddy trails bogged with stinking irrigation water and lined with fields where farmers with bull carts harvest wheat and sugar-cane, abruptly end at an intricate colonial red-brick church and missionary school building.

Founded during British rule in 1903 by a Roman Catholic priest, the village has long fought for religious freedoms.

Unlike most Christian enclaves in the central Punjab region, Khushpur's community is relatively wealthy and highly educated, producing doctors, engineers and teachers, as well as its minority rights advocates.

Roman Catholic Bishop John Joseph shot himself in 1998 in protest against the blasphemy laws and is also buried here, as is Father George Ibrahim, who fought for a Christian school and was killed in 2003.

Pakistani Christians are observing 40 days mourning for Bhatti. But the government has resisted calls from the international community to amend the blasphemy law, saying it has no plans to do so.

"After the assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti, the Christians are very sad and angry, it has hurt their hearts and they are now feeling unsafe in this country," said local Jacob Paul. "They feel that they will be suppressed here forever. It is a common thought over here that as long as this blasphemy law exists, their lives are not out of danger and the fuelled tensions can grip them at any time."]]>
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			<title>Hundreds gather to condemn Shahbaz Bhatti's assassination</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/127495/hundreds-gather-to-condemn-shahbaz-bhattis-assassination</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/127495/hundreds-gather-to-condemn-shahbaz-bhattis-assassination#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Fri, 04 Mar 11 06:37:06 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[sohail.khattak]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=127495</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[The demonstrators carried placards and chanted slogans against the increasing amount of extremism in the country.]]>
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				<![CDATA[The Christian community in Karachi condemned the assassination of Federal Minister for Minority Affairs Shahbaz Bhatti on Thursday, and demanded that the government arrest the culprits and give them exemplary punishments.

Hundreds of Christians, members of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Minority Wing, Human Rights groups and Christian community organisations, assembled at the Karachi Press Club to condemn the brutal killing of the minister.

The demonstrators carried placards and chanted slogans against the increasing amount of extremism in the country.

Speaking at the occasion, Pastor Robert said the ruthless and cold-blooded murder of Bhatti was a grave setback for the struggle for tolerance, pluralism and respect for human rights in Pakistan. He also termed the incident as a conspiracy against the country.

Robert added that Bhatti was a strong supporter of minority rights in Pakistan and his struggle and efforts would not go in vain. He said the minister always raised his voice against religious extremism and intolerance in the country and underlined the need to take steps to create harmony among all the sections of the society.

Massiha Millat Party Sindh President Liaquat Munawar Sourya also condemned the assassination of the slain minister. “Until certain black laws regarding minorities are not changed, such incidents will continue,” said Sourya.

He added that such cases are common in Punjab due to the landlord system, where people use such laws for personal enmities. “The law should remain the same but if someone falsely accuses someone then he should be charged under 297-C as well” Sourya added.

Mushtaq Matta of PPP Minority Wing demanded the immediate arrest and execution of the assassins.

“We give respect to Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) even more than the Muslims. The laws are good but used for personal aims by people against the minorities,” said Matta.

He added that Bhatti and Salmaan Taseer were few of the figures who strived to give justice to the minorities and were silenced but their blood will give birth to revolution in the country.

&nbsp;]]>
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			<title>Legend lost: Political painter AR Nagori passes away</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/103997/legend-lost-political-painter-ar-nagori-passes-away</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/103997/legend-lost-political-painter-ar-nagori-passes-away#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Sat, 15 Jan 11 06:06:52 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[express]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=103997</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[His work revolved around martial law, violence, women suppression.]]>
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				<![CDATA[Artist, teacher and social activist Abdul Rehman Nagori — better known as AR Nagori — passed away on Friday afternoon due to multiple complications. He was 70.

He was taken to the Aga Khan University Hospital emergency on Wednesday after he complained of chest pains, Naveed Nagori, his son, told The Express Tribune. He was having withdrawal symptoms as he was not responding to the new medicines prescribed and his blood pressure could not be controlled.

AR Nagori was famous for his paintings calling for socio-economic reforms. Throughout the early 1980s - Ziaul Haq’s military regime - he held exhibitions of his work titled “anti-martial law” and “anti-dictatorship”.

His bright-coloured paintings exuded slap-in-the-face defiance, urging the onlooker to think about change - if not bring it about. Most of his work revolved around five major issues: martial law, dictatorship, women suppression, violence and minority rights.

AR Nagori was the founder of the fine arts department at the University of Sindh and Federal College of Arts, Jamshoro.

“He had such a genuine personality. He was a great painter and father,” said his son, Naveed. “This is the loss of a legend.”

Artist Abdul Fatah Daud Poto, his student and friend who has compiled a book Socio Political Painting in Pakistan and Painter of Protest on AR Nagori, said, “In Pakistan’s history, there was no painter like Nagori sahib. He was a committed artist who never painted for money. He always raised a voice against the injustice in the country even though he was jailed, tortured and threatened in the regime of Ayub Khan”.

“Once he was holding his exhibition at the Karachi Airport where Ziaul Haq told him, ‘Nagori, you are a good man but your work is bad as you paint political art’,” narrated Daud Poto.

His funeral prayers will be held at Jamia Binoria today (on Saturday) and the burial will take place at Defence Housing Authority Graveyard.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 15th, 2011.]]>
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			<title>Aasia Bibi’s release: UK councillor brings his campaign to Lahore</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/95777/aasia-bibi%e2%80%99s-release-uk-councillor-brings-his-campaign-to-lahore</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/95777/aasia-bibi%e2%80%99s-release-uk-councillor-brings-his-campaign-to-lahore#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Tue, 28 Dec 10 06:06:43 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[abdul.manan]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=95777</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[UK councillor urges government to take action against ‘hate speech’ of a Peshawar based cleric against Aasia Bibi.]]>
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				<![CDATA[UK councillor Raza Anjum has urged the federal government to take action against the ‘hate speech’ of a Peshawar based cleric against Aasia Bibi, he told The Express Tribune.

Anjum said he would present his findings on the Christian woman, who had been sentenced to death on blasphemy charges by a lower court, to the Eurporean Union’s political secretary Alexander on Wednesday. Aasia Bibi is currently imprisoned at the Sheikhupura jail. Her appeal is pending before the Lahore High Court.

Anjum, who arrived two weeks ago, has been meeting with government and opposition leaders and senior bureaucrats to push for the protection of Pakistan’s minority groups. He has met with Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer, Senior Adviser to the Punjab Chief Minister Sardar Zulfiqar Khan Khosa, provincial Law Secretary Shaukat Ali and Aasia Bibi’s lawyer.

Speaking with the Tribune, Anjum said that in his meeting with Governor Taseer, he pointed out the need for the authorities to control and detain those engaged in hate speeches, such as the cleric who recently promised a reward of Rs500,000 for anyone who killed Aasia Bibi even if she is acquitted or pardoned.

He said the government should take a firm line on such incidents. He observed that Article 506 of the Pakistan Penal Code prohibits threats to the life of another. He said the governor had assured him that his reservations would be conveyed to the federal government.

Anjum said the governor had told him that he had met with Aasia Bibi despite strong opposition from the local clerics. He added that Taseer informed him that his Pakistan Peoples Party’s MNA Sherry Rehman had moved a private bill for procedural changes in the blasphemy laws.Anjum said that if the federal government was scared of confronting the cleric who gave the edict against the Christian woman then the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) should take notice of it. Raza Anjum said that the UK High Commission had barred him from meeting Aasia Bibi in jail because of security threats. He added that he was scheduled to meet the prime minister to seek her release. After a three hour meeting with Khosa, Anjum said, he was disappointed to find that Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader proposed no policy, structure or mechanism for the protection of minority rights and the promotion of human rights. He said that that PML-N apparently feared alienating its conservative voters.

Anjum said Taseer and Federal Minister Shahbaz Bhatti seemed to be more clear on minority issues as well as the concept of human rights.

Anjum said that he would use his Muslim and Pakistani roots to impress the gravity of the issue upon the Pakistani leadership.

He said that Pakistan is a democratic country and it would be in the country’s interest if the issue is resolved without any undue incrimination.

Raza Anjum was elected a councilor in Essex in 2007 at the age of 22. He graduated in law from University College London. Both his parents belong to a Kahloon family of Toba Tek Singh.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 28th, 2010.]]>
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			<title>Plugging the leak</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/87622/plugging-the-leak</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/87622/plugging-the-leak#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 08 Dec 10 21:24:06 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[sami.shah]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=87622</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Julian Assange’s most marked legacy is that he almost, quite nearly, made me like President Zardari.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[WikiLeaks will not change the world and that will be its greatest tragedy. A few years from now, when Hollywood makes the movie about the fast-talking Julian Assange (starring Justin Bieber) and how, in a bid to impress a girl who wouldn’t go out with him, he revealed that most diplomats and world leaders are gossipy trash talkers, we will all nod and go “oh yeah, I remember that vaguely, now let’s watch it in 3D.” Sure, over the next few weeks we will continue to pore over the leaked documents, or at least the few choice paragraphs that local newspapers will poorly misquote. The info revealed here appeals to the same poorly evolved reptilian part of our brain that still scours the web looking for new celebrity scandals and inadvertent cleavage. I, myself, have spent the last two days overloading Google’s servers with searches for Colonel Gaddafi’s apparently voluptuous Ukranian nurse. For journalistic research purposes I assure you.

That said, Assange’s most marked legacy, other than to make any future diplomatic meetings extremely awkward, is that he almost, quite nearly, made me like President Zardari. It was a brief moment I assure you, measured in nanoseconds, but it happened. I can’t quite put in words how it made me feel, so shocked was my system by what was occurring within it, but I know that I was left with a deep sense of self-loathing followed by a need to curl up and cry. If this is how Fauzia Wahab and other PPP-Z cronies feel all the time, then they have my deepest sympathies. I understand your suffering now.

What caused this scientific near-impossibility to occur? How did the universe betray all its laws and rules to allow such an abomination to take place? Why did my thoughts defy all logic, rationality and reason to consider our president in a positive light? The blame can only fall on Saudi King Abdullah. By insulting Zardari he, inadvertently, offered the highest praise. After all, if the monarch at the helm of a human rights disaster that daily defecates on free speech and minority rights and is essentially the interest-free credit card for al Qaeda and the Taliban, thinks Zardari is “rotten” then he can’t be all that bad. I would much rather have a president that King Abdullah hates, than one that he loves.

In an ideal world, Pakistanis would see how terrible is a Saudi government that goes easy on terrorism, encourages attacks against Iran and withholds funds from Pakistan while waging singular war on our Houbara Bustard population. We would shun them and their brand of toxic beliefs, demand our armed forces stop behaving like the King’s personal military retinue and expel al Qaeda and Taliban from our borders instead of playing that exhausting game of “my Taliban is different from your Taliban.” Maybe we would even take the time out to reconsider how badly Saudi influence has affected our society, give Sherry Rehman the support she deserves and amend the blasphemy law, thus saving an innocent woman’s life.

But none of that will happen. We are all so devoid of influence on matters of import that even such blatant exposure will have no effect on the long-term strategies of power players. America, Israel and Saudi Arabia will continue to build towards a military assault on Iran. We will continue to let our intelligence agencies provide a nurturing teat to the Taliban. Saudi influence in Pakistan will further erode all semblance of religious tolerance and development of non-extremist forms of Islam and religious extremists will continue to hold intelligence and compassion hostage.

Oh well, at the very least, I got to experience what it is like to respect our president. Now if you will excuse me, I have a Ukrainian nurse to interview.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 9th, 2010.]]>
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			<title>Blasphemy case: I just want my mother back</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/80004/%e2%80%9ci-just-want-my-mother-back%e2%80%9d</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/80004/%e2%80%9ci-just-want-my-mother-back%e2%80%9d#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Mon, 22 Nov 10 03:33:05 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[ali.usman]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=80004</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Esha, the 10-year old disabled daughter of Aasia Bibi is anxiously waiting for her mother to come home.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[Esha, the 10-year old disabled daughter of the woman who has been awarded death sentence in a blasphemy case, is anxiously waiting for her mother to come home. She doesn’t understand the complications that might be involved in acceptance of her mother’s clemency appeal. All she wants is that President Zardari approves it immediately so that she could be with her mother again.

For the last one and half years, Esha has been weeping for her mother and now her hopes have been raised after Governor Salman Taseer met Aasia Bibi in Sheikhupura Jail on Saturday and assured her that he would take her clemency appeal to the president  to pardon her death sentence.

Talking to The Express Tribune at the family residence in Sheikupura on Sunday, Aasia Bibi’s family said that they were hopeful. “I just want to see my mother,” said Esha, as tears streamed down her cheeks.

The family has been in shock since the day when Aasia Bibi was accused of blasphemy. They lost hope in the middle of ever seeing their mother again. Now they say things may change. “Many people have been coming to this place for the last few days and Esha asks everybody who is that will bring her mother home,” Sidra, the 18-year old elder sister, said.

Aasia has five kids: Naseem, who is married, 22-year old son Imran, 18-year old Sidra, 10-year old Esha and 9-year old Esham. Esha is most attached to her mother as it was she who took care of the special child.

“I met my mother on Tuesday,” Esha said as she also confessed in an innocent tone that she feared her mother was going to die.

The rented house is quiet apart from the visitors who bring a bustle of activity and hope. Sidra now looks after the family chores as well as the needs of Esha. “We have passed through very tough days. The day when my mother was awarded the death sentence was the worst day of my life.,” said Sidra, adding “My father and brother didn’t tell us at first but when we came to know we all got very depressed and didn’t eat anything. Now we have hope that she will be pardoned.”

When asked what plans they have to please their mother when she comes home Sidra replied with a mischievous grin, “What’s the use of a surprise if we reveal it. We are ready to do anything which pleases her and the biggest surprise for us will be her release”.

The family has migrated from their original village of Ittanwali to Gloria Colony, a Christian locality in Sheikhupura. Sidra says: “We don’t want to go back to our village. The women who accused my mother used to work with her and now there isn’t anything left for us there.

We have our house there but we don’t plan to go back”.

She said that they shifted from their native village to Sheikhupura 15 days after the incident as they received threats their house would be set on fire.

Nine year old Esham, who is the youngest daughter of Aasia, now remains quiet most of the time. “She remains afraid and often goes out to play when someone asks her about our mother,” Sidra said. The family is scared and the children traumatised.

Aasia Bibi, a 45-year-old Christian woman, was sentenced to death by additional district and sessions court in Sheikhupura on November 9 for allegedly making derogatory remarks against the Holy Prophet Muhammad (pbuh). Aasia, mother of five, has denied the charge of blasphemy. She told investigators that she was being persecuted for her faith.

Ashiq Masih, husband of Aasia, said that the reason for the accusation was a quarrel that had taken place in which some people had taken offence. He said that a quarrel broke out over serving water to some women. Aasia at the time worked with some women in a Falsa garden owned by one Muhammad Idrees. A woman asked her (Aasia) for a glass of water. When Aasia brought the water in a jug for all the women, one of them said that she “couldn’t drink water from the hands of a Christian.” The other women said that this did make a difference but in between all this, a quarrel ensued between the women and Aasia. “Four days later, a blasphemy case was registered against Aasia,” said Masih.

Interestingly, the incident took place on June 14, 2009 while the FIR was registered under 295-C of Pakistan Penal Code in Saddar Police Station Nankana on June 19, 2000. The complainant, one Qari Salam, a local cleric, wasn’t even present on the occasion of the quarrel between Aasia and the women. “I wasn’t present when the blasphemy occurred but I came to know about this through the women who listened to Aasia speaking against the Holy Prophet (pbuh). I became a complainant because the women couldn’t go to court and the police station,” Qari Salam told The Express Tribune. When asked whether he could pardon Aasia now, he replied, “This is not my personal matter. I could if it were my personal matter. She should be punished”.

Napoleon Qayyum, who is associated with the Community Development Initiative (CDI), a non-profit organisation working for minority rights, brought this incident to the knowledge of President Asif Ali Zardari. He told this correspondent, “Things could have been settled had the issue been resolved at the local level. But it is difficult for a judge in the lower courts to go against the pressure of right-wing parties in blasphemy cases.” The verdict has been challenged in the Lahore High Court already. But the downside to all this is that Aasia has been in jail for over one and half years so far, he added.

When contacted, presidential spokesman, Farhatullh Babar, told The Express Tribune that the President would look into clemency appeal when it reaches to him. “Clemency appeals reach the President through the proper channel. We will look into this when we receive it. Right now, I cannot comment as to how long it will take for it to reach the president,” he maintained.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 22nd, 2010.]]>
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			<title>Fate of 18th amendment to  be decided tomorrow</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/64998/fate-of-18th-amendment-to-be-decided-tomorrow</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/64998/fate-of-18th-amendment-to-be-decided-tomorrow#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Wed, 20 Oct 10 03:30:04 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[qaiser.zulfiqar]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=64998</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[Supreme Court is set to announce its much-awaited verdict on Thursday.]]>
			</description>
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				<![CDATA[The fate of the new piece of legislation known as the 18th amendment hangs in the balance as the Supreme Court is set to announce its much-awaited verdict on Thursday (tomorrow).

According to a handout issued on Tuesday, the 17-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry will pronounce its judgment in the high-profile case on Thursday.

Notices have also been issued to all petitioners and defendants of the amendment.

The hearing of the case was started on May 24, which has continued with brief intervals for more than four months. The bench had concluded the hearing on September 30 and reserved its judgment.

Around 20 petitions had been filed in the apex court challenging certain parts of the amendment, but chiefly the new procedure laid out for the appointment of top judges under amended Article 175-A of the Constitution.

The first petition was filed by Nadeem Ahmed Advocate through his counsel Akram Sheikh. The second petition was filed by the District Bar Association Rawalpindi through Muhammad Ikram Chaudhry, who is also a candidate in the upcoming Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) elections. The third one was filed by the Wattan Party through its chairman Barrister Zafarullah Khan, the fourth petition was filed by the SCBA  through Hamid Khan and the fifth by the Pakistan Muslim League-Zia chief Ejazul Haq and his counsel Ghaffarul Haq.

Later, civil society represented by Salman Raja and J Salik also filed a petition through their counsel Zulfiqar Bhutta and challenged the amendment regarding minority rights enshrined in the Constitution.

During the case hearing, the head of the constitutional reforms committee Senator Raza Rabbani expressed his desire to appear before the bench in defence of the amendment but later he denied this in writing, saying that since the court had not summoned him, he decided not to appear before the court after consulting friends.

The letter written by Raza Rabbani further stated that Advocate Akram Sheikh had argued , “What is the need of judicial review when the court could not scrap any of the amendment?” He said the constitutional committee did not feel the need to consult the chief justice on Article 175-A. He pleaded that Article 175-A should be excluded from the Constitution as it is in conflict with the basic structure of the Constitution.

Sheikh said that in a letter he had requested PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif to refrain from making amendments that were against the basic structure of the Constitution, adding that the court could nullify such provisions which were against the Constitution.

Raza Rabbani was made respondent in three petitions and he was served notices according to the rules and regulations.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 20th, 2010.]]>
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			<title>Media’s role in promoting religiosity</title>
			<link>https://tribune.com.pk/story/64220/media%e2%80%99s-role-in-promoting-religiosity</link>
			<comments>https://tribune.com.pk/story/64220/media%e2%80%99s-role-in-promoting-religiosity#comments</comments>
			<pubDate>Mon, 18 Oct 10 22:10:22 +0500</pubDate>
			<dc:creator>
				<![CDATA[zohra.yusuf]]>
			</dc:creator>
			<category><![CDATA[Pakistan]]></category>
			<guid isPermaLink="false">https://tribune.com.pk/?p=64220</guid>
			<description>
				<![CDATA[The onslaught of religious programmes on electronic media has diminished society’s capacity for rational thinking.]]>
			</description>
			<content:encoded>
				<![CDATA[When Pakistan Television (PTV) started broadcasting in 1964, the few hours of transmission would commence with recitation from the Holy Quran. It was a short, perfunctory acknowledgement of Pakistan’s status as a Muslim-majority state. Ramazan and Muharram were also appropriately observed. On Christmas, the token programme on the significance of the day was broadcast, though the airwaves remained dominated by programmes on Jinnah’s birthday.

Advertising, too, was free of any religious images and messages. In fact, PTV’s code prohibited the use of mosques, azan, images of namaz, etc in advertising as it was considered an exploitation of religion for commercial purposes.

So when did the airwaves of Pakistan succumb to religiosity? Veering towards religion in programming was really more of a conscious decision. Since all insidious developments are rightly blamed on the military regime of General Ziaul Haq, so should the ‘Islamisation’ of the electronic media. In retrospect it appears that the introduction of the mullah to the idiot box was just the beginning of a trend that would have more dangerous repercussions in the coming decades.

One of the earliest programmes that promoted the most conservative interpretation of Islam and sharia was the series of lectures given by our first televangelist, Dr Israr Ahmed. His programme, “Al Huda”, quickly became popular among those in whose minds Zia had already planted seeds of doubt about what ‘true’ Islam was all about. Women’s rights, even the curtailed version granted to them, were definitely anti-Islam and those women active in the nascent women’s movement of the early 80s were special subjects of his ire.

With the advent of private television channels, the commercial potential of religion as a programming component struck media owners. The ground, as they knew, had already been laid in previous decades. From dars get-togethers to the lecture circuits of Farhat Hashmi, the middle-upper classes had already become deeply hooked on to religion.

The rabid opinions on Islam, expressed on most private television channels, soon made the government-owned PTV appear as a model of liberalism. Moreover, the incessant onslaught of religious programmes (or references to religion) on the electronic media has diminished our society’s capacity for rational thinking. Today, most debates in Pakistan are conducted in the context of Islam and sharia — from matters of every day life to issues of women and minority rights. Even more troubling are the narrow confines within which these discussions are held; the differences that arise are generally over interpretations pronounced by various clerics hogging the airwaves. While religious programmes spread religiosity and consequently enlarge their viewership, channels use this creation of ‘demand’ as a reason for the ‘supply’ of more religion.

The precarious consequences of treating religion as primetime entertainment have not been studied in depth in Pakistan. However, the link between growing intolerance and religion on air has been clearly established. In September 2008, Amir Liaquat in his talk show, “Aalim Online”, on Geo appeared to endorse the killing of Ahmadis. Some days later, three members of this community were murdered in different parts of Sindh. Neither Geo nor Liaquat showed any remorse. Liaquat’s popularity rating remained high and the channel continued to promote his show through large billboards. In drawing room conversations, references to the sayings of Amir Liaquat are even now fairly common. Musharraf is reported to have wept while watching some of his programmes, just as Zia shed tears during the sermons of Dr Israr. However, the nexus between military dictators and televangelists should be discussed elsewhere.

It is not difficult to see where bigoted opinion expressed on primetime television is leading the country. Attacks on non-Muslims are on the rise, as are incidents of sectarian killing. Self-regulation is unlikely as the propagation of religion is bringing in hard cash for many channels.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 19th, 2010.]]>
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