100 Christian homes burned by mob in Lahore

[Kunal Biswas]

 

[Blackwater]

pakis should not complain Gujarat and Ayodhya ,now on wards:shocked::shocked:

 

[LordOfTheUnderworlds]

Our homes were not burnt | Pakistan Today | Latest news | Breaking news | Pakistan News | World news | Business | Sport and Multimedia

By:Hashim bin Rashid Thursday, 14 Mar 2013 1:44 am | Comments (5)
Christian community must turn to politics to end 'untouchability'



What choorhi and what is it about our caste, everyone runs from us,
Underpaid, reduced to slavery, at the doorstep of the ruler,
Only a share was given to us from the heap of left-over grains
–Bullah Shah, Mein Choorhaetari Aan

Two hundred houses were looted and burnt – Bibles were burnt to ash and crosses put to flame – by a mob of over 2,000 Muslims at Joseph Colony, Badami Bagh in Lahore. At the heart of it was a drunken exchange of abuses between two men: a Muslim and a Christian. Somehow, after one day of silence, the exchange was reported to have involved certain allegedly 'blasphemous' remarks against the Prophet (PBUH). Sunni Tehreek activists entered the fray to act as 'witnesses' to the apparent quarrel in the Christian's billiards shop. First: the accused's father was arrested under mob pressure last Friday, then the accused turned himself in. However, the climate was reported to have been amplified by the entry of certain external actors and police officials asked the over 200 Christian families in Joseph Colony to leave. They did. The next morning, it was as if police had invited the mob to ransack, loot and burn Joseph Colony as they stood and watched. Media got a full out view of the mob attack. And slowly but surely viewers began to react and condemn the incident – but while confined to drawing rooms.

The homes that were burnt were not ours.

We would call the violence: "outrageous", "madness", "shameful" but it would not force us to get out of our homes – or even question the everyday practices which cause such an event. Surely, the daily discrimination against Christians, labelling of them as 'untouchables' – let alone questioning the perimeters of the blasphemy law is what the debate should have been about. "The violence was wrong but the accused must still be punished" was the view many presented on the day. The fact that a drunk man's testimony – let alone accusation – has little weight in the due process of law. To the mob who burnt down Joseph Colony "the drunk Muslim was upholding the honour of their Prophet".

The irony in the ground reality was lost on most Muslim Pakistanis – but certainly not on the city's 500,000 strong Christian community. Protests began the same day and lasted till Tuesday. But more reason for outrage should have been found. The same police force that stood by and watched 3,000 people loot and plunder Joseph Colony, fired over 500 tear gas canisters on Youhanabad, the largest Christian settlement in the country, with over 4,000 households. Over a hundred Christians were arrested at a point when no one had been arrested for the Joseph Colony mob attack. Policemen in riot gear told a reporter in this newspaper: "These are choorhas."

The term evoking the severe caste-based discrimination prevalent in the subcontinent Muslims maintains that Christians/choorhas (used interchangeably) are 'untouchables'. This was clearly the basis of the Asia Bibi case which came to light in late 2010 and by early 2011 had resulted in the murder of both the then Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer and Minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti. Having spent two months back then trying to get to the bottom of the case, the only undisputed fact was that the cleric and two accusing ladies believed that "Christians could not shake hands with Muslims, let alone eat with them". The principle the public protests against the demand for her release defended was not the honour of the Prophet (PBUH) but the right to maintain the status of Christians as 'untouchables'.

The same is true of the police action in Youhanabad. On a day when the Christian community came out in large numbers to the Press Club and Punjab Assembly and blocked a number of major traffic routes, the use of heavy handed police tactics on them was designed to achieve nothing but ensure that the community is not able to exert its influence on the city's politics. If this was not the Punjab government's purpose then may we ask: where was the tear gas and riot police when Joseph Colony was being burnt down?

Most are already aware that the Badami Bagh incident was not in isolation – but took from similar mob attacks over alleged blasphemy in Shantinagar in 1997, Bahmniwala and Gojra in 2009. Those responsible for these earlier attacks are still running scot-free, with even the clerics who incited the Muslim community against the Christian community, still manning their respective pulpits. These earlier incidents were put down to "rural unruly-ness", without recognition of the dual spatial and social segregation that operates on Pakistani Christians. The Christian quarters in Punjab's new colonial villages was always kept separate. The Christians – or choorhas – would provide the menial labour of the village. The fact that colonial segregation practices have been transplanted onto urban space is rarely given much thought.

A recent publication, The Unconquered People, traces the 'untouchables' status we give to the Christian community to the caste system which originated with the arrival of the Arian people in the Indus Valley Civilisation. A tribe known as the Chandhala tribe in the period is understood to be the mother tribe of modern day subcontinental Christians. The kaafi quoted at the start of the article by Bullah Shah refers to organised social movements amongst the choorha community in the 18th century against state and social oppression in the Punjab. The kaafi was erased from record due to its radical content since it involved a high caste Muslim (Bullah Shah) claiming untouchability and making it subversive. It bred resistance and thus had to be neutered.

It entered British colonialism and the roots of subcontinental Christianity spread amongst the lower castes, including the choorha caste. However, subcontinental Christianity, originating in the colonial project, was constructed as deeply loyal to the state and deeply subversive to resistance – much like the early Christianity in Latin America. Biblical traditions are being cited amongst the Pakistani Christian community today to justify continued loyalty to a state which has both failed to provide them security of life and dignity – and repressed them when they have stood up for their rights.

Unlike subcontinental Christianity, Latin American Christianity developed a strong tradition of resistance which became known as liberation theology – a project which saw human emancipation in the material world as the primary end that religion exhorted human beings to pursue. A more recent example is that the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, considered deeply pro-poor, claimed to be deeply religious and was known to call "Jesus Christ" his hero.

Caste is not merely caste. It has a material basis. If the economic conditions of a community are the same, then claims that they have been raised to dignity are fake. As it stands, it is the pastoral community, with its political patrons in mainstream political parties, which is the greatest hurdle to an active politics emerging from within the Christian community calling for an end to discrimination against them. This is quite unlike the strong resistance movements around adhivasi or dalit that developed across the border in India.

The fact that there is no elected Christian sitting in all five assemblies in Pakistan should be taken as an indicator. The so-called Christian political leadership has been developed by mainstream political parties, who dole out reserved seats to those most loyal to them. Nothing can be a greater farce than the fact that the Christians sitting in the assemblies and Senate are not accountable to their own community. There is a strong case for the old demand of a dual vote for Christians to be raised with more force after the Badami Bagh incident. Big names amongst the community such as Senator Karman Michael and Akram Gill have done nothing more than issue press releases. The situation is so bad that one of the recent bishops of Lahore declared that "Christians will need an armed militia" if such incidents continue. The remarks were reportedly blacked out by the media.

Incidents such as the Badami Bagh incident are not the worst we have done to the Christian community – these are merely the tip of the iceberg. It is the day to day treatment of Christians that must outrage us more. But more than the outrage we feel, it is the Christian community that must stand up and present a united political agenda. If Imran Khan and Tahirul Qadri can fly in and bring over 100,000 people to a public rally in Lahore, why can the half a million strong Christian community in the city not organise a similar rally? It is the Christian community that must break out of their fear and claim their dignity if such incidents are not to be repeated. Dignity will not be bestowed by anyone from the outside.

Perhaps Bullah's conclusion to Mein Choorhaetaree Aan can serve as inspiration:

We are neither Hindu nor Turk, of neither this class nor that
Indifferent from halal and haram, we don't respect either
When the beloved face was unveiled, O Bullah, we were afraid of thrones no more

The writer is the general secretary (Lahore) of the Awami Workers Party. He is a journalist and a researcher.

 

[Virendra]

Express Tribune had published an article critical of a larger failure of the State.
The writer Saroop Ijaz is a lawyer and partner at Ijaz and Ijaz Co in Lahore
Pakistan's real image – The Express Tribune

The local police told the inhabitants of Joseph Colony, Badami Bagh, to evacuate their houses as they were going to be attacked the next day. This is shocking incompetence or perhaps complicity, even by our standards. However, if one absorbs the full implication of this warning, it seems to point to the major crisis we face. There is no "State" in Pakistan. It has withered away, and not in the Marxist sense but in the Weberian one. The monopoly over violence has been lost; violence has been privatised and has been sold cheap. The failure to honour Salmaan Taseer, the forgetting of Shaheed Shahbaz Bhatti, the intent to surrender to the TTP, the failure to crackdown on sectarian murderous outfits and now this. To be told officially that you are on your own.

Joseph Colony was not in Pakistan to begin with. A "Christian" housing society, separate housing communities, fenced and isolated, like Hazara town in Quetta, ghettos, perhaps in some way also like DHA on the other side of town. The Christians in Joseph Colony still love Pakistan. Why they do beats me, because this country surely does not love them back. It is not enough that they live in abject poverty in separate settlements. The faithful citizens of Pakistan proper have also the liberty to set fire to their houses and lives when fragile sentiments are hurt. The sentiments in front of which no other or no one else's sentiments have any value — churches, crosses and Bibles will be burnt. How arrogant a person or a group has to be to believe that their sentiments triumph everyone else's, also law and common decency. The minorities in Pakistan are guilty unless proven innocent, and then guilty still.

There will be multiple inquiries and findings, just like Shantinagar, like Gojra and then we will wait for the next incident and then another round of inquiries. It will happen again, because the Blasphemy Law provisions will remain on the books and we will keep on talking gibberish about correct interpretations and applications, silent peace-loving majority, etc. Does no one realise that all religions stand naturally and unequivocally in blasphemy to all other religions? There can hardly be sacrilege to a thing that you, in the first place, do not believe exists or is true. When the Ahmadi places of worship were attacked in Lahore, condemnation was hard to find; everyone in power wanted to change the topic. If the Muslims were required to sign a statement similar to the Ahmadi declaration on the passport in any part of the world, what do you think the reaction would be? Thermonuclear war, perhaps. Similar to this is the case of the members of the Tableeghi Jamaat. They attempt to save the infidels by inviting them to the truth but at the same time believe that once in if you want out, you are to be killed. They just do not notice the minor contradiction in their sales pitch.

How would it feel to lose everything and then hear that the real tragedy is that the image of this country has been tarnished? Your suffering and loss do not matter; you are just a marketing prop. You should, perhaps, be ashamed for having your houses burnt and bringing embarrassment to the Fatherland. Pakistan does not have an "image" problem. The gap in the conveyed image and reality is there, but it is the other way around. Pakistan should be thankful that most of the world does not read or hear the Urdu press, the local Friday Khutba, banners on Hall Road, Lahore, or pamphlets in the Civil Courts. Pakistan has an image that is softer than it deserves.

Most of this happening in Mian Shahbaz Sharif's tenure should not come as a surprise. It was, after all, his political mentor Ziaul Haq who brought us most of these gifts. The elder Mian tried to become the "Amir-ul-Momineen". The younger Mian is just keeping the torch blazing, in Shantinagar, Gojra and Joseph Colony. Zia made the "Objective Resolution" an operative part of the Constitution as Article 2A. Hence, very early in the Constitution all non-Muslims are told this country thinks that their beliefs are false and will be treated with little regard. Mr Bhutto had already extended the non-Muslim category in his attempt to appease the religious element; the appeasement did not work, and nevertheless, we were left with discriminatory laws. The non-Muslim category has for all practical purposes seen another increment; this time, the Shias are moving from the green to the white. Despite new entrants, the white portion seems to be diminishing in size and will soon disappear at the present rate. It will be painted red in the meantime.

Pakistan is hostile to all non-Muslims. That is a simple, cold truth. The laws are discriminatory and the pious population does not like the non-believers either. The size of the processions in favour of the killer Qadri as compared to the vigils for Salmaan Taseer was enough evidence of the violent majority. It is not only madrassa-trained jihadis either. Mumtaz Qadri was garlanded by lawyers and is represented by a former chief justice; the mastermind of the attack on Ahmadis in Lahore apparently is a doctor.

There has never been much of an argument for blasphemy laws. Yet, a lazy one was that it was there so that people do not take the "law" into their own hands when religious sensibilities are hurt. The suspect, Savan Masih, was already under custody when Joseph Colony was assaulted. That is all there is to this argument.

The scenes of Joseph Colony are the real "image" of Pakistan. That image is Pakistan going to hell on a metro bus. The rest, the cultural and literary festivals, the song and dance it seems are diversions, marketing ploys. The Blasphemy Law and Objectives Resolutions will have to be repealed, not amended or implementation ensured, etc; Repealed. Religion will have to be taken out of all public life and statutes books before we can legitimately complain about our "image". That day will not be tomorrow, or the day after, or next year or perhaps decade. Till that day, if it ever comes, the least we can do is to be honest as we remain bystanders to slaughter and await our turn. Honestly, Pakistan does not welcome the non-Muslims or the "wrong" Muslims and encourages their murder and pillage

 

[Illusive]

Can we live in Pakistan any longer? We request the UN to give us refuge because we cannot find any justice in this country.

Every minority community has been asking this question, i don't understand how can this merciless killing by pakis of their minority can be tolerated by international community. Only option is dividing Pakistan, or else the Sunni pakis will leave no survivors of other ethnicity or religion.

Free Balochistan, Free Sindhudesh.