In court: Slippers withdrawn from market after blasphemy complaints

The petitioner claimed that ‘Om’, a word sacred for Hindus, was imprinted on the soles.

HYDERABAD: A Lahore-based slipper manufacturer withdrew his products from the market after complaints from the Hindu community that a sacred word, ‘Om’, was imprinted on the soles.

The Sindh High Court Hyderabad circuit bench on Thursday discharged a petition filed by Hindi activist Veerji Kolhi against the marketing of the slippers by Rafique Shoe Factory. The factory owner, Khwaja Saad Khalid, submitted a written apology to the court and informed the bench that he had also apologised to the Hindu community through advertisements published in several newspapers.

“I cannot read Sanskrit, the language in which the word is written,” Khalid told the bench. “There was no intention to harm the sentiments of our Hindu brothers and sisters. We only printed it as a design.” According to him, thousands of pairs of the slippers were marketed in Sindh and Punjab.

Kolhi, in the petition filed in April 2014, also named the police of the two provinces as respondents for failing to prevent the sale of a product containing blasphemous symbols. He maintained that Hindus revere the word ‘Om’ in the same way that Muslims revere Allah. “The word identifies three attributes of Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Sustainer and Shiva the Destroyer,” read the petition.

Following Khalid’s apology, Kolhi withdrew his plea to try the factory owner under criminal charges and seal the factory.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 4^th, 2015.