Political Parties Must Prevent Instrumentalisation Of Religion

 News Desk

Lahore: Speakers at a convention said that regressive policies are being framed to appease the violent forces and mindset that inculcate hatred among citizens on the basis of their identity. Political parties must not surrender their power to those forces that use religion for their political gains and prevent progressive policy actions.

Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) Executive Director Peter Jacob said that it is the responsibility of the Senate to introduce amendments in the National Commission for Minorities Bill, 2023, to make the prospective minority rights body truly functional, effective, independent, autonomous and resourceful.

The CSJ organised a 7th convention urging the political parties to deliver on their pledges made in the party manifestos to the minorities’ rights. Pressing issues such as forced conversion, establishing the National Commission for Minorities, compliance with Judgment regarding minorities’ rights, and affirmative action for religious minorities were discussed.

Benazir Shah said that regrettably, political parties lack an understanding of human rights issues and they seem to be non-serious about addressing the issues that minorities face.

Shah added that textbooks developed under the single national curriculum of English, Urdu, and Social Science carry Islamic content which should not be taught to religious minorities as guaranteed in Article 22(1) of the Constitution of Pakistan.

Professor Sardar Kalyan Singh Kalyan mentioned that school curricula and textbooks should focus on promoting inclusion, diversity, critical thinking, learning outcomes, and interaction between majority and minority students to curb religious intolerance. Suneel Malik presented the findings of the manifest assessment report ‘Promises to Keep and Miles to Go’ regarding the assessment of the ‘Delivery of the Pledges’ about minorities’ rights in election manifestos.

Malik added that the political parties must focus on actions to implement the pledges they make in the election manifesto to improve the human rights situation in general, and religious freedom and minorities rights in particular.

The participants suggested some measures to address human rights challenges such as religious intolerance, extremism, and discrimination which are as follows:

Amend the provisions in the constitution that are incompatible with the fundamental rights to remove conceptual inconsistencies about equality of rights among citizens. Moreover, the term ‘non-Muslim’ should be avoided and minorities used in the constitution.

They suggested to set up empowered inter-ministerial and cross-sectional implementation committees at the federal and provincial levels to oversee the progress, persuade the concerned ministries and departments to take legally effective and serious measures to comply with seven court orders from the landmark Supreme Court judgment regarding minorities’ rights issued on June 19, 2014.

Participants recommended to introduce educational reforms after consultation with civil society and to ensure that the policy measures in pursuance of improving curricula, textbooks and examination systems contribute to developing inclusive and equitable quality education. Also, they must not violate the constitutional protection of religious freedom and non-discrimination under Articles 20, 22 (1), and 25 of the Constitution of Pakistan.

Criminalise forced faith conversions through protective legislation to bring perpetrators to justice for their crimes involving child marriage, forced conversion and sexual violence, they added.

They further urged to set up an empowered implementation committee to give effect to the recommendations of the Judicial Inquiry into the incident of Gojra in 2009 in order to prevent the misuse of blasphemy laws and reduce the exposure of minorities to intolerance.