Rajan Gandhi
Citizen’s Amendment Bill is reality now, a law which brings a new dawn in the lives of lakhs of refugees who suffered for decades in the three neighboring countries of Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan, all practical examples of how nations evolved on the basis of religion can never progress whatever reasons they can give but the logic proved totally misconceived and as Home Minister pointed out in Rajya Sabha why the division of India on the basis of religion was agreed upon by the Congress at first place. The Liaquat-Nehru Pact, signed on April 8, 1950, was a bilateral treaty between India and Pakistan, where refugees were allowed to return to dispose of their property, abducted women and looted property were to be returned, forced conversions were unrecognized and minority rights were confirmed. Minority commissions were set up in both countries. More than one million refugees migrated from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) to West Bengal in India. The pact was opposed by Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, founder of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, who relinquished his position as Cabinet Minister when Nehru went ahead with the pact. At the time of Pakistan’s creation the ‘hostage theory’ had been espoused. According to this theory the Hindu minority in Pakistan was to be given a fair deal in Pakistan in order to ensure the protection of the Muslim minority in India but the stark reality of treatment meted out to minorities is shocking beyond imagination.
Religious discrimination in Pakistan is a serious issue in modern-day Pakistan. Christians, Hindus, Atheists and Ahmadi Muslims among other religious groups in Pakistan are time and again discriminated against by refusing jobs, loans, housing and other similar things simply because of their choice of religious faith. In some cases Christian Churches and Ahmadi worship places and their worshippers are even attacked. What can be more tragic than Khawaja Nazimuddin, the 2nd Prime Minister of Pakistan’s statement: “I do not agree that religion is a private affair of the individual nor do I agree that in an Islamic state every citizen has identical rights, no matter what his caste, creed or faith be” and every subsequent Pakistani government ensured that it lived up to Khawaja’s statement.
One of the significant issues being faced by the minority communities is the abuse of the blasphemy law. People belonging to minority religions are being falsely accused of using derogatory remarks against the Prophet Mohammad which can result in fines, lengthy prison sentences, and sometimes the death penalty. The persecution of religious minorities in Pakistan was brought to the fore due to the international profile given to the case of Asia Bibi, a Christian woman who was convicted of blasphemy in 2010 and who languished on death row for eight years before her conviction was overturned by the Supreme Court. Not long following her release from prison, Asia Bibi left Pakistan to resettle in Canada. As tragic and traumatic as her case was, she remains fortunate for having survived her ordeal. Many of those persecuted for religious reasons have not been so fortunate. Over the last 30 years, some 1,500 individuals – Christians, Hindus and people from Muslim religious minorities – have been charged under blasphemy laws. Minorities often live in fear, have to hide their identity, adopt Muslim names and mannerisms to survive and avoid persecution while hundreds of temples have been vandalized or demolished. In the aftermath of the Babri Masjid demolition Pakistani Hindus faced riots. Mobs attacked Hindu temples throughout Pakistan. Jain Mandir at Jain Mandir Chowk in Lahore was destroyed by the bigoted Muslims mobs in 1992 and the Government changed the name of Jain Mandir Chowk to Babri Masjid Chowk, which became the official name afterwards. At the time of partition in 1947, almost 23% of Pakistan’s population was composed of non-Muslim citizens. Today, the proportion of non-Muslims has declined to approximately 3%. Condition of Sikhs is also same as in 2009, the Taliban imposed Jazia on non-Muslims and houses of Sikh families were demolished in Orakzai Agency for refusing to pay Jizya. Forced conversions are a routine affair now.
Afghanistan has similar story as patrons of terrorists, oppressors of women, willful destroyers of ancient culture, Afghanistan’s Taliban regime has much to answer for. When it comes to human-rights abuses, nothing appears to match the evidence of atrocities on minority Hazara people. Gruesome details of mass executions and Balkans-style “ethnic cleansing” occurred in Afghanistan. In the 70s, there were around seven lakh Hindus and Sikhs and although there is no census data available in the country to estimate exact numbers due to years of war and conflict, the community members themselves speculate that there are perhaps no more than a few thousand Hindus and Sikhs left in Afghanistan today. Even Statues of Buddhas of Bamiyan were not spared, built in the 6th Century before Islam had traveled to the central Afghanistan region, the two Buddhas of Bamiyan were famous for their beauty, craftsmanship and of course, size. In March 2001 Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar ordered the Buddhas destroyed. They were subsequently blown apart and left in rubble.
Plight of Bangladeshi Hindus is also pathetic. On February 28, 2013, the International Crimes Tribunal sentenced Delwar Hossain Sayeedi, the Vice-President of the Jamaat-e-Islami to death for war crimes committed during the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War. Following the sentence, activists of Jamaat-e-Islami and its student wing Islami Chhatra Shibir attacked Hindus in different parts of the country. Hindu properties were looted, Hindu houses were burnt into ashes and Hindu temples were desecrated and set on fire. Our Home Minister Amit Shah also mentioned an incident after the assassination of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rehman in Bangladesh, a wave of violence, torture and persecution against minorities that had started there. In October 2001, Bangladesh Hindus faced dastardly attacks after the electoral triumph of the BNP-Jamaat alliance. In one night, nearly two hundred women were raped in Char Fashion of Bhola and amongst them were an eight-year-old girl, a middle-aged amputee and a seventy- year-old woman. Such was the abuse that the Abhayanagar, Jessore’s Hindus faced that several of them jumped into the Bhairab River as it deemed safer than the land that they had seen as a home for long.
History has proven time and again that no country has progressed on the basis of single religion theory, whole Middle East countries are practical examples and so are Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh. The development and recognition of heterogeneous India is a testimony that together we can survive and prosper not by ethnic cleansing as done in Kashmir and Gulf countries or our neighboring countries. Opposition has no moral right to oppose every move to correct the wrong done in the past like triple talaq, Article 370 or now CAB and correlate it to Muslims as progress of every citizen of India is the duty of Government and none of these laws have targeted Muslims, especially NC and PDP as abrogation of Article 370 gave Indian citizenship to West Pakistan Refugees and CAB will give relief to lakhs of refugees, right to live with dignity and now focus should be on settlement of internal refugees, Kashmiri Pandits who are still living in exile in their own country. The pain and agony of being displaced must be addressed, process has started and it will be accomplished beyond any doubt but the sooner it is done the better it will be.
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