In June 2008, Asiya Bibi, a Pakistani farm worker and mother of five, fetched water for others working on the farm. Many refused the water because Asiya was Christian. The situation got ugly. Reports indicate Asiya was harassed because of her religion and the matter turned violent. Asiya, alone in a hostile environment, naturally would have attempted to defend herself but was put in police custody for her protection against a crowd that was harming her.
However, that protection move turned into one that was to earn Asiya a death sentence. A case was filed against her under sections 295-B and C of the Pakistan Penal Code, claiming that Asiya was a blasphemer. Her family will appeal against the judgment in the Lahore High Court.
The Asiya case raises the fundamental question of how Pakistan’s minorities have been left unprotected since the passage of the blasphemy law.
There may have been no hangings on account of the law but it has facilitated the spread of intolerance and populist rage against minorities, often leading to deaths. There is also a direct link between the Zia-ist state’s intolerance against minorities and the rise of criminal treatment of Ahmadis.
Cases have ranged from the Kasur case to the more recent Gojra case, from the mind-boggling row of cases between 1988-1992 against 80-year-old development guru Dr Akhtar Hameed Khan, to the case of the son of an alleged blasphemer, an illiterate brick kiln worker who was beaten to death by a frenzied mob.
Although doctor sahib faced prolonged mental torture, he was saved from the maddening rage that has sent to prison, and in some cases devoured, many innocent, poor and hence unprotected Pakistanis.
There is a long list, prepared by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, of unjust punishments handed down to Pakistani citizens whose fundamental rights the state is obliged to protect. Beyond punishments, minorities live in constant fear of being lethally blackmailed by those who want to settle other scores.
Yet most political parties have refrained from calling for the law’s repeal or improvement in its implementation mechanism.
When, in the early 90s, I asked Nawaz Sharif sahib to criticise the hounding of Dr Khan, his response was a detailed recall of the story in which Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) went to ask after the health of a non-Muslim woman who repeatedly threw garbage over him. He condemned what was happening but said politics prevented him from doing so publicly. Later, General Musharraf, advised by other generals, reversed his announcement of changing the law’s implementation mechanism. Small crowds protested against it. Among politicians, very few exceptions include the PPP parliamentarian Sherry Rehman and, more recently, the ANP’s Bushra Gohar, who asked for its amendment and repeal.
Already sections of the judiciary have been critical of flawed judgements passed by lower courts in alleged blasphemy cases. Recently in July, Lahore High Court Chief Justice Khawaja Sharif quashed a blasphemy case against 60-year-old Zaibunnisa and ordered her release after almost 14 years in custody. According to the judgment, the “treatment meted out to the woman was an insult to humanity and the government and the civil organisations should be vigilant enough to help such people.” Surely the Bench should know the plethora of abuses that Pakistan’s minorities have suffered because of an evidently flawed law.
A message more appropriate, perhaps, would be to repeal the black law that grossly undermines the Constitution of Pakistan and indeed the teachings of Prophet Muhammad, one of the most tolerant and humane law-givers humankind has known. This environment of populist rage, fed by the distorted yet self-serving interpretation of religion principally by Zia and a populist mixing of religion and politics by a politically besieged Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, must be emphatically challenged. A collective effort to roll back these laws must come from parliament, the lawyers’ forums, the judiciary, civil society groups and the media.
This was originally published in The Express Tribune.
Keep it up Sarah, this verbal abuse and blackmail tactics of these mullah propagandist should be confronted.
You are right, the only ones who are regularly burning Qurans these days are these Taliban types who blow up masjids.
We Muslims must all speak out against these Shariah seking enemies of Islam.
Adnan, you are still not answering.
And you are still lying.
A photograph is a proof.
Unless you are saying your Shariah loving Taliban have also not been blowing up mosques. In which case you are lying again.
Why do you Shariah lovers lie so much?
And why do you like killing Muslims, burning Qurans and blowing up mosques.
All of that is a fact, so stop whining like a wimp and either sit quietly and sulk or go and biurn another Quran since you and your friends like doing that so much? Why do you Shariah lovers burn so many Qurans and blow up so many mosques?
@Sarah, girl, you need to get back to school to learn the difference between “Propaganda” and “Proof”. Thankyou! *grin*
p.s: SO far I did not get any reply from you or your community member about their desperation to start talks with Talibans. Why is like that? Speechless or you people have not been allowed to defend it yet?
Not only is the Blasphemy Law of Pakistan intellectually wrong–as if Creator of the whole Universe needs protection from we human beings–but the Law is also a convenient tool to settle purely worldly disputes. Yes, probably the minorities in Pakistan are mainly targeted but even the ‘mainstream’ Sunni Muslims can be targeted easily. Of that, here is a personal account:
My family in Karachi is in a business partnership with some cousins. Between the partners there is a dispute over business assets. There are pending cases in civil courts about competing claims. Once my brother had a heated exchange with a cousin-partner in one of the business-offices. It almost came to the blows and my brother ended up throwing down some papers from the partner’s table to the floor. Papers were mostly newspapers and business documents. But, within them, there was a piece or two with Quranic writing. The partner sensed a chance and registered a Blasphemy Case. The Case was delegated to some special investigations and special court proceedings with limited legal rights for my brother.
Long story short: It cost hundreds of thousands of Rupees, 1.5 year of hassle, bribing judges and police by both sides, pulling political muscle by both sides. All that so that my brother could not be put to fast-track to the possible hanging! Eventually, during my last visit to Pakistan in November 2009 I arranged a meeting and both sides settled the dispute. But in the preceeding 1.5 years plenty of hair turned grey, plenty of heart-aches and, most sadly, probably contributed to my own father’s heart attack and death in October 2009.
Again, my family is a mainstream Sunni Muslim family in Pakistan. Urbane and educated. Observe the rituals of Islam like most Karachi-ites do. Yet the Blasphemy Law’s blindness is obvious to me. One of the senior cops investigating the Case told my brother that the Law is so bad that if the cousin were to gather outside our house and yell that there is a person committed Blasphemy inside the house it could easily gather 200-strong lynch mob!!!
Repeal the dang Law now!
Sarah, you are right. More Qurans are burnt by Shariah seeking Taliban than anyone else.
But, don’t get into debates with these trolls who show up each time they feel that Taliban are being attacked like barsaati keeray, no logic or argument will get past their skulls.