Early Times Report
JAMMU, Dec 25: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on Saturday said he will "show" the Narendra Modi government "how to treat minorities", amidst a controversy over Bollywood actor Naseeruddin Shah's remarks on mob violence in India. Shah finds himself at the centre of a major controversy over his remarks on the alleged mob lynching cases in India following the killing of a policeman in Uttar Pradesh's Bulandshahr district earlier this month.
Significantly, it was a leading Pakistani Irfan Hussain who called the Pakistan PM Imran Khan's bluff saying the plight of the minorities in Pakistan, including Hindus, Christians, and even Shiite Muslims, is very miserable. Reflecting on the plight of the minorities and calling the bluff of the majority community, particularly in Punjab, Irfan Hussain said: "With sickening regularity, human rights organizations, including the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, report incidents in minorities have been targeted by extremist groups. Shias, , have been killed in large numbers. While the state may not have been complicit, it has created an environment of impunity by failing to arrest, try and punish those responsible for these murderous attacks. Mullahs incite mobs at regular intervals to torch religious places of the other communities . Hapless minorities are regularly victimized under the blasphemy laws".
He didn't stop just here. He further said: "We often complain of the growing Islamophobia in the West. But what our minorities suffer in Pakistan on a daily basis is far worse. There is discrimination against them in jobs, schools and society as a whole. Sanitary workers are considered sub-human, and have been unable to escape their untouchable status despite their conversion . Many educated non-Muslims have emigrated to escape the discrimination they faced in Pakistan. In secular states, they have thrived, finding opportunities denied to them in their homeland. Hazaras have risked their lives to flee violence: in Quetta, they live as virtual prisoners in an enclave. Due to their distinctive Central Asian features, they are easily identified as Shias by extremists. Hundreds have been killed, but few assailants have been arrested. A major factor driving the rise of Islamophobia in the West is the persistent threat of terror attacks carried out by jihadist individuals and groups. The US, Britain, France and Germany, among other countries, have suffered multiple atrocities carried out against innocent civilians. India, too, has had its share of cross-border terror attacks carried out by extremist groups".
"Imagine that a major building in, say, Lahore, had been blown up by a Christian group, and there were hundreds of casualties. In such a scenario, people would be wading in blood in local settlements. We tend to blame Gen Zia for the environment of fake piety that pervades the country. But the reality is that when we created a state in the name of religion, it was only a matter of time when the most extreme version of the faith dominated the public discourse. In this atmosphere of religious zeal, non-Muslims rapidly became second-class citizens, tolerated at best, and suspected of being anti-Pakistan at worst".
Irfan Hussain advised Pakistan and his advise : "We need to take a hard look at our treatment of minorities, not because of American pressure, but to become a just society".
Kashmiri separatists and half-separatists, including Geelani, Mirwaiz, Yasin Malik, Farooq Abdullah, Omar Abdullah, Saif-ud-Din Soz, Mehboba Mufti, would do well to take cognizance of what the majority community in Pakistan has been doing to minorities and non-Punjabi Muslims within Pakistan, Pakistan-occupied-Jammu & Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan and stop the ongoing separatist movement in Kashmir in their own interest and in the interest of the community, they claim, they represent. |
