Adil Najam
Ordinarily, I might have just posted this photograph below as a comment on yesterday’s post on Diwali celebrations in Karachi (also here). But please, just look at the people in this photograph; its way too interesting to be relegated to a comments section.
The occasion is a Diwali celebration at the Islamabad Headquarters of the Pakistan Muslim League, standing (and clapping) extreme left is Syed Mushahid Hussain, Secretary General of the Pakistan Muslim League, next to him is Ijaz ul Haq (Minister of Religious Affairs, and son of Gen. Zia ul Haq), fourth from left is Tariq Azim, State Minister for Information.
The Daily Times (31 October, 2006) provides more details of the event:
Members of the Hindu community from across the country participated in the event where they performed their religious rituals and traditional dances in candlelight to mark the event… A number of office bearers of the party and ministers, including PML Secretary General Mushahid Hussain Syed, Minister for Religious Affairs Ijaz-ul-Haq, State Minister for Information Tariq Azim, Minister for Minorities Affairs Mushtaq Victor and members of the National Assembly (MNAs) Bindara, Donia Aziz, Akram Masih Gill and others were present on the occasion. Officials of the Indian High Commission also participated in the event.
Hussain said that Quaid-e-Azam had envisioned a Pakistan where all the religious minorities enjoyed equal rights. He underlined the importance of inter-faith harmony for the greater prosperity of the nation and announced that the PML would also celebrate the birthday of Baba Gurunanak next week. He said that the minorities played a vital role in building any nation. He said that the present government was allocating high importance to giving all minorities’ equal. Hindus are playing a leading role in country’s economic development and the present government will leave no stone unturned to ensure their safety and well being, he added.
This is, of course, a political gesture – some might even say a gimmick. But if so, let us have more such gestures and gimmicks. They will, in time, hopefully help change our perceptions and treatment of religious minorities in Pakistan.
glad PML is mending its ways and thoughts about white part of pakistani flag
earlier post proud pakistanis
we need to be proud of pakistani multicultural multi religious and multi ethenic identity, Hindu community and specially sindhi hindus have contributed a lot to welfare of Pakistan. first minority minister Goginder nath mandal, famous crickters Anil dalpat,danish kaneria, snooker champion navin parwani, international Designer Deepak perwani, International film maker satish anand and everready pictures, shabnum and music director roben gosh, first pakistani to swim across english channel(cannot remember the exact name) many famous judges in lower judiciary, adhoc chief justice of Pakistan Justice Bagwan Das, famous thakar of sind Rana chander singh, Human rights and political activist sobogyan chandani.
Hindus are proud Pakistanis but some people have always doubted their loyalities to Pakistan
I am fully aware of the diversity within India of why Deepavali is celebrated. I have grown up celebrating Naraka Chaturdashi early in the morning with my South Indian family, Lakshmi Puja in the evening with my Bania friends, then celebrated Kali Puja in the night with my Bengali friends and lit lamps and burst crackers after that with my family and North Indian friends to commemmorate Rama’s return to Ayodhya. I was fortunate to grow up in multiple parts of the country and to live in extremely multicultural (Govt.) housing estates, so am fully exposed to the rich diversity of India’s culture.
My question was specifically about a potential new flavour to Diwali in Sindh that I have not seen anywhere in India. Perhaps somebody who actually knows about it will respond to my original question.
Sridhar,
Coming from a land where history has been less documented and transferred more by way of mouth (No wonder Bollywood has songs)…I can very well understand your question. Among the oft repeated 1000 stories as to why Diwali is celebrated, the 999th story says that Diwali was celebrated for the first time when Ram returned victorious from Lanka with Sita. This victory of good over evil was celebrated by the burning of fire crackers (I don’t know if the Chinese had invented fire crackers by then. Probably mighty Hanuman must have jumped to Beijing to get some….who knows).
Leaving aside the political aspects of this story/image, it is interesting to me to see the cultural aspects of Diwali celebrations in Pakistan and specifically in Sindh. If this is an accurate representation of how Diwali is celebrated by Sindhi Hindus, it seems from the image that Diwali celebrations there incorporate elements of the Ramlila theatrical form, which at least as far as I know, is not associated with Diwali in India but is associated with Dusshehra.
The above image shows two actors dressed up like Ram and Sita, just like in the typical Ramlila. Does anybody happen to know if this is characteristic of Diwali in Sindh?
A nice gesture but we all know too well the crooks seen in the picture. Why does Ijazul Haq have this job by the way? Does any one know? He is not even a political need. Sadly, at one point I had respect for Mushahid husain but he too has become a spineless ass. To quote Cawasjee on these ministers.. “where do they find these people?”