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Do I have the right to remain Ahmadi?
Try voicing your opinion and you may end up in jail. Ahmadis have only one right - the right to remain silent.
In 1966, nearly 180 million people in the US received Miranda rights – the right to remain silent to avoid self-incrimination.
Half a century later, a religious community in Pakistan, another country of nearly 180 million people, is facing a rather caustic version of the Miranda rights. They don’t have the right, but a duty, to remain silent.
The religious group is the Ahmadiyya community.
Two recent events frame the issue aptly. First, on January 29, 2012, clerics organized an anti-Ahmadiyya rally in Rawalpindi, attended by 5,000 madrassah students, chanting threatening anti-Ahmadiyya slogans and demanding to take over a 17-year-old Ahmadiyya ‘place of worship’. Then on February 11, 2012, approximately 100 lawyers, from the Lahore Bar Association, rallied to ban Shezan drinks on court premises.
So while the clerics have the right to incite violence against Ahmadis, by publicly calling them ‘worthy of death’ and madrassah students have the right to wall chalk phrases like, ‘hang them all’, schools have the right to expel Ahmadi students and lawyers have the right to ban Shezan - Ahmadis, on the other hand, have the right to remain silent!
Is it not true that the right to remain silent assumes a right to free speech in the first place? Something the Ahmadis have been long deprived of?
Unlike the Miranda rights, this ‘right’ to silence is by definition, self-incriminating. Try to voice your opinion as an Ahmadi and you may land in jail under section 295-B/C of Pakistan’s penal code offers pending a three year imprisonment simply for exercising your right to free speech. Try voicing dissent, and you may end up in a graveyard. Even after death, the mullah menace has the right to white wash Quranic verses like ‘God is gracious, ever merciful’ from an Ahmadi’s tombstones.
Consequently, hundreds and thousands of Pakistani Ahmadis, including myself, have tearfully migrated to other countries, but not without sustaining one final jab; the passport application. It requires 97% of Pakistan’s Muslim population to complete a declaration stating that not only do they consider all Ahmadis as ‘non-Muslims’ but they also declare the founder of Ahmadiyya Community to be an ‘impostor’. While I have never met a Pakistani Muslim who refused to sign this absurd declaration, Ahmadis do scratch it out. Their passports are thus stamped with the word ‘Ahmadi’ and the plight of their right to remain silent continues.
For decades, the Ahmadi perspective was systematically hushed under the pretense of ‘sensitivity’. But organizations like Amnesty International are now calling it, ‘a real test of the authorities’. And 0nline newspapers and opinion pieces by courageous Pakistanis have started challenging the suffocating status quo.
For the Pakistani government, there is a way to be good again. Rein in the mullah, stop defining who is and who is not Muslim, and subject the medieval anti-Ahmadiyya laws to a modern paper shredder. Give Ahmadis the right to free speech before offering them the right to remain silent.
Finally, the Ahmadiyya diaspora is choosing to expose this oppression by speaking up. The mullahs and their proxy politicians will have to deal with the bitter truth.
Maybe a glass of Shezan could have helped to sweeten the bitterness. But then I guess that’s just too Ahmadi.
COMMENTS (254)
s faith is only God
s responsibility. Please try dont grab God`s positionNO! Sadly you do not have any right to be an Ahmadi in this SUNNI REPUBLIC! The Hindus and Sikhs lost their rights long time ago. Then the Christians lost their rights. The Ahmadi community lost thier rights in the 70's I believe. Now as a Shia my community is loosing thier rights! I cant believe the level of apathy the government is showing to the killing of innocent Shia's in this country. Mr. Jinnah what where you thinking? If this was the type of independence you wanted for us then I am sorry I would have preferred living under the British or Hindus anyone other than the followers of YAZID (LA). As for Qadianis, you are sadly misguided individuals may Allah guide you to the right path of Ahl-e-Bait. However I condemn any violent attacks on your community and your worship centres. I have religous debates with alot of people namely radical sunnis who view me a Kaafir, thankfully I am alive, but I believe in the end it is Allah to decide and we as Muslims should not perfom Allah's duty! Since he has already given us certain duties to complete and we should perform those. The ultimate sad part for Pakistan is that in Germany there was one Hitler. In Pakistan there is one on every street. I normally like saying Pakistan Zindabad at the end of my posts however I just dont feel there is any point now. I mean I cant possibly support a nation which does nothing to prevent the killing of innocent Shia's.
*Note I dont mean to say all Sunni's are followers of YAZID (LA), I am referring to the Taliban, Laskar-e-toiba, Al-Qeada etc.,Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
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