Security concerns: Christian woman seeks action against men threatening her family

Says families of some of her husband’s Muslim students wrongly believed that he was teaching them Christian texts

LAHORE: A Christian woman has moved a court seeking protection from two men threatening to kill her and her husband. She has also said that the Model Town SHO is harassing her at the behest of the suspects.

On Monday, an additional district and sessions judge had directed the SHO concerned to refrain from harassing the family and sought his detailed comments on the matter.

In her petition, the petitioner said her family had moved to Lahore from Multan after her husband, who used to teach children from income-poor families at their home, was accused by some Muslim families of teaching Christian religious texts to their children.

She said that the families had found some books on Christianity in their children’s bags. She said the books had been taught only to children from Christian families. The Muslim students might have taken the books home by mistake, she added. She said the families did not listen to them and took the matter before some Muslim clerics in the area.

The following day when her husband was teaching children at the roof of their house two men forcibly entered their house and beat up her husband, she said. Later, announcements were made from some mosques in the area, repeating the allegations against her family, she added.

Fearing for their safety, she said the family had decided to leave Multan and move to Lahore. Meanwhile, she said her husband had gone abroad to pursue higher education.

A few months later, the woman said, she had gotten in touch with a property dealer in Multan to sell their house in the city. During the telephonic conversation, she said she had shared the address of her Lahore residence with the dealer. On April 25, she said two men, identified as Muhammad Nawaz and Moosa Khan, appeared at her residence and asked for her husband. On her refusal to disclose his whereabouts, she said they had again accused her husband of teaching books on Christianity to Muslim children and threatened to kill them.

She said that she had reported the matter to the Model Town SHO but he did not take action on it and harassed her instead.

She requested the court to provide police protection to her and to direct the police to take action against the suspects for issuing death threats to the family.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 3^rd, 2016.