Sixty-two-year-old Rizwan Hashmi is like any other retired gentleman his age. On a personal front he has led a fulfilling life, worked hard and raised his four children to become educated and successful professionals. However, over the last couple of decades, and more specifically the last few years, his life and that of his family has been torn apart by blinding hatred.
Not only has Rizwan had to deal with his colleagues transpiring to frame him and get him fired but he was forced to leave his family home and relocate within the country due to safety concerns. Three of his children fled the country after growing tired of being targets.
Like thousands of others from his community, Rizwan Hashmi is paying the price for being an Ahmadi. The excessive prejudice and downright violence the community has been subjected to stems from extreme misinterpretation of a religion which is first and foremost a religion of peace and preaches tolerance as opposed to targeted annihilation of a community that may not share the same beliefs.
We often hear Ahmadis being referred to as ‘wajibul qatl', meaning liable to be killed. Despite this very real threat to his life, Rizwan refuses to leave his motherland, Pakistan. What he does want, however, is his rights as a citizen of this country.
This wasn’t always the case though, Rizwan recalls. “My family belongs to a village in Sialkot where intermarriages were very common. There was no conflict and by and large people were very tolerant and forbearing.”
Times have drastically changed since then. Rizwan tried to be as patient as he could until he finally packed up and moved to Rabwa. "There were instances when garbage was thrown inside my house; it was pelted with stones and attempts were made to set it on fire. We lived in a constant state of fear and insecurity.”
Of late, news reports on the Ahmadi community being targeted have been regular. Take the last few months for example. From a 72-year-old British Ahmadi doctor being jailed in Lahore for ‘posing as a Muslim’ to some Ahmadis not being allowed by neighbours and police to sacrifice animals this Eidul Azha, there is no shortage of attempts to harass and repress an already marginalised community.
Yet another report told the story of an Ahmadi graveyard being desecrated and vandalised. A separate report was on three members of the community who were killed in Karachi. Sadly, such reports consistently pour in to the news, so much so, that many Ahmadis feel it has desensitised the nation to their plight.
A seasoned researcher, commentator and archivist Ahmed Saleem has written extensively on Pakistan’s political and social issues. When asked to comment on the ongoing atrocities faced by minorities in Pakistan, he bitterly responded: “As a nation, we are bothered about any real or imagined atrocities against the Muslims, for example in Palestine, Myanmar, Syria or India. We are also ready to burn property worth billions of rupees on a blasphemous film and profane cartoons. But we are not pushed when a community is targeted in our own country and subjected to inhuman treatment.”
Speaking at a literary seminar, Wusatullah Khan, a senior journalist and commentator, sarcastically said,
“The way Pakistan has been treating the Ahmadi community is reminiscent of The Third Reich's treatment of the Jews in the 1930s and ’40s.”
Khan added, “The same thing is happening here day in and day out and it happens to be the only point of reference on which all the sects, namely Sunnis, Shias, Deobandis, Wahabis, Barelvis, Salafis/Takfiris, etc, are united.”
While other religious minorities are not faring much better, Ahmadis are particularly under fire and this is mainly due to the constitutional cover being provided to those discriminating against them. The discrimination has been legalised by the state with a constitutional amendment on Sept 6, 1974, explicitly designating Ahmadis as non-Muslims.
After the passage of other similar laws, such as The Ordinance XX which later came to be known as the Blasphemy Law, changed the whole connotation and lives of the besieged community. With this, an Ahmadi can be jailed for three years for ‘posing as a Muslim’ or for outraging Muslim feelings.
“The violence increased manifold when the state became a party against its own citizens,” explains Aamir Mahmood, in-charge of the press section of the Jamaat-i-Ahmadiya. “This is a universally accepted principle that laws should treat everyone equally but in our case Ordinance XX targeted only our community. This law has provided legitimacy to the perpetrators of violence.”
The legal fiasco has trickled down to the masses over a period of time, brainwashing them towards inhumanity.
Mehmood explains further how this prejudice translates into real persecution. “The religious and sectarian organisations circulate the names and company addresses in the markets and bazaars and ask people to boycott us and not to indulge in any kind of business transactions. And given the first available opportunity, they try to burn, ransack and damage our shops and offices."
“This harassment is going on multiple levels. Sometimes, they take out our community magazines and journals and those businessmen who advertise in the publications; their names are made public and they have to face the consequences (read blackmail and extortion). It seems that all avenues to earn livelihood are closing for us.”
Rizwan had faced a similar situation during his employment at the Wah Ordnance Factory. “Once I was posted in the ‘high explosive section’ where my colleagues plotted to blame me for preaching my faith and to seek my dismissal. However, the sympathetic GM foiled their efforts and I was reassigned to another department,” he said.
Hussain Naqi is a well-known human rights activist and the national coordinator of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP). According to Naqi, the basic problem is that the state is not fulfilling its responsibilities by neglecting to act against those instigating and waging violence against Ahmadis. Public gatherings where fiery speeches are made against Ahmadis and instigate people towards violence continue unabated.
When asked what measure should be taken to end this discrimination, Naqi suggests:
Anti-Ahmadi laws should be repealed as they are both against the spirit of the constitution and they negate basic human rights principles.
All gatherings where people are instigated towards violence should be prohibited and there should be a complete ban on circulating hate material.
“The Ahmadi community should be given full religious freedom to observe and preach their religion according to the international human rights’ regulations. They should be allowed to celebrate their religious festivities as other minorities do. Finally, the state should fulfil its responsibilities and show tolerance and forbearance as it is equated to a mother who treats all her children equally,” he adds.
By following these remedial measures, the ongoing repression of the community can be controlled. It is high time that all progressive forces should come together against the blatant injustice and remember that bigotry by nature is a progressive phenomenon and in the coming days we could all be its victim. As Niemaller writes in his famous poem “… when they came for me, there was no one left to speak for me”.