Tag: forced conversions

  • Pakistani film ‘Hum-Saya’ receives Best Short Documentary award at Venice Film Festival

    Pakistani film ‘Hum-Saya’ receives Best Short Documentary award at Venice Film Festival

    Director Dawood Murad’s venture ‘Hum-Saya’, produced by the Centre For Social Justice, has received the prestigious award for ‘Best Short Documentary on Human Rights’ at the Venice Intercultural Festival 2023. The film focuses on the story of two girls who are abducted, forcibly converted and then married off, while also exploring the turmoil their families undergo.

    In an Instagram post, the director revealed that the film will also be screened in Venice, Italy, on June 23 and later at Kellogg College, Oxford, on June 16.

    A recent report compiled by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan found that in the year 2021, at least 60 cases of forced conversions were reported in the media, out of which 70% of the girls were under the age of 18 and were from Sindh.

    The data also revealed that blasphemy cases were on the rise in the country. In 2021 there were 585 blasphemy cases registered in Punjab, out of which 16 were filed against the Ahmadi community.

  • 18-year-old Hindu girl shot dead for resisting kidnapping and forced conversion

    18-year-old Hindu girl shot dead for resisting kidnapping and forced conversion

    Trigger Warning: Violence/Senstive Content

    Pooja Kumari, an 18-year-old Hindu girl was murdered in Rohri, Sindh. As per media reports, she was shot during a failed abduction attempt. As per reports, the name of the deceased soul is Pooja Kumari Oad.

    Three men reportedly broke into Pooja’s house to kidnap and forcibly convert her. She was shot dead by a man named Wahid Bux Laghari, after she resisted a kidnapping attempt. According to journalist Sanjay Sadhwani, accused Wahid Laghari has been arrested.

    https://twitter.com/TheSindh8/status/1506006522542833665

    Hashtag #JusticeForPoojaKumari has been trending on Twitter, as people are using this hashtag to condemn the incident to demand justice for Pooja and her family.

    Read more- Forced conversion issue in only three districts of Sindh: Noor-ul-Haq Qadri

    https://twitter.com/AsadSol13260604/status/1505883862320226304

  • Forced conversions are against the spirit of the constitution 

    On Wednesday, a parliamentary committee rejected the anti-forced conversion bill after the Ministry of Religious Affairs opposed the proposed law. According to Dawn, Religious Affairs Minister Noor-ul-Haq Qadri said the “environment is unfavourable” for formulating a law against forced conversions and warned that forming a law on forced conversions would “create further problems for minorities” as they will be made more vulnerable. He also said the proposed law will deteriorate peace in the country.

    It is unfortunate that the minister thinks such a law will lead to problems and will affect peace in the country. Minorities in Pakistan make up a very small number as more than 96 per cent population of the country is Muslim. So why would a bill that is against forced conversions, something that our religion also does not allow, make the minorities vulnerable? The Constitution of Pakistan guarantees that the rights of the minorities would be fully protected. Forced conversions are against the spirit of the Constitution as well as our religious teachings. 

    The Joint Action Committee for People’s Rights (JAC), a collection of  37 human rights groups, in an open letter has urged Prime Minister Imran Khan to take legal as well as administrative measures to protect minorities, especially the under age girls from forced conversions and marriages. The letter has also urged PM Khan to ensure the approval of the draft bill for timely legislation. The JAC also expressed its concern on the statements of the Minister for Religious Affairs on the draft bill to curb forced conversions, recalling that such statements are not only against the spirit of the Constitution, judgments of the Supreme Court of Pakistan but are also in contradiction with the stand taken by the PM against forced conversion of minority groups in Pakistan.

    Hopefully, the government will address this issue soon. We know that the majority of these forced conversions are underage girls from minority communities. Such practices should not be condoned by the government. Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah had envisioned a Pakistan where the minorities would feel safe. We should not let our founding father down. 

  • Medical board to ascertain age of teenage Christian bride

    Medical board to ascertain age of teenage Christian bride

    The Sindh High Court has ordered the formation of a medical board to determine the age of Arzoo Raja — a teenage Christian girl who was kidnapped, forced to marry a 44-year-old man in Karachi after conversion to Islam.

    The matter was brought to the court attention after her parents approached the high court, seeking custody of their daughter. They had said that the girl was underage and didn’t convert out of her own free will.

    The high court, however, had rejected the plea, allowing the girl to stay with her alleged husband, Ali Azhar. This prompted a strong response from the civil society and the government that filed another plea in the case.

    Subsequently, the court ordered police to recover the girl and sent her to a shelter home. The purported husband was also detained and sent on judicial remand.

    As a two-member bench comprising Justice KK Agha and Justice Amjad Ali Sahito took up the case today (Thursday), the counsel representing Azhar and Arzoo urged the court to quash the forced marriage case against him.

    The court, however, observed that the matter now was about the girl’s age. To this, the counsel said a separate law would be applied in that case. Arzoo also told the bench that she wanted to stay with her alleged husband, whom she married out of her own choice.

    When Arzoo informed the court that she was 18 years of age, the bench pointed out that the NADRA documents showed her a teenager.

    The counsel representing the state in the case asked the bench not to record the statement of Arzoo at this point.

    Observing that the case can only proceed once the girl’s age is determined, the bench directed authorities to submit a final report on her age in the next hearing on November 9.

    The CASE:

    On Oct 27, a two-member bench of SHC had admitted a petition that claimed that she was 18 years old and had married Ali Azhar and converted to Islam with her free will. The petition also sought protection against alleged harassment of the girl’s family.

    Underage girls in such cases in Pakistan come under intense pressure, including threats to them and their families, to give false statements in court.

    Azhar allegedly abducted Arzoo in Karachi’s Muhalla Railway Colony West Camp Road locality on Oct. 13, according to the family, which registered a kidnapping case on the same day.

    On Oct. 15 police summoned them to the local station and showed them documents claiming that Arzoo was 18 years old and had willingly converted to Islam after marrying Azhar.

  • Forced conversions

    Forced conversions

    According to her parents, a 13-year old Christian girl Arzoo Raja was abducted by a man in his 40s, forcefully converted to Islam and then married to him. Then a local court dismissed the plea moved by her family to send her to a shelter home so that she was released from the custody of her older Muslim spouse. The court said that Arzoo Raja accepted Islam willingly and she told them that she was not abducted and was not forced to marry the 44-year-old.

    Even if the girl says she was not forced to convert to Islam and did it wilfully, how is child marriage being allowed? The husband says she is 18 and so does she in an affidavit but NADRA records show she was born in 2007. Her marriage certificate does not mention her age or details of her CNIC. A medical certificate needed to prove a person is 18 was not provided either. Legal experts say that child marriage is a very integral part of forced conversions. They say that the law against child marriage is inadequate. Some believe that all child marriages should be prohibited and declared invalid but legal age of girls is something that many religious leaders do not agree with.

    The National Commission for Minorities has finalised a draft law to curb forced conversions but the law will be finalised only after consultations with the provinces and the leaders of all schools of thought. Senate Committee on Minorities’ Rights led by Senator Anwarul Haq Kakar is also working on the issue of forced conversions by getting all stakeholders, from minorities to religious leaders, on board.

    Forced conversion of Hindu girls in Sindh is an issue that has been highlighted a lot. Minorities’ representatives say that why is it that only their girls are converted and not men. But in some cases, the conversions are not forced. They are be due to economic reasons or to get away from families but the tool to justify these conversions is consent. “Why is it that mainstream religious parties are never involved in conversion of girls from minority communities and only fringe groups like Mian Mithu’s, etc?” a parliamentarian questioned while speaking to The Current. They said that administrative laxity, if turned to agility, can decrease the cases of forced conversions.

    Despite laws, their implementation is more important. We hope the courts will not give a stamp of approval to child marriages and forced conversions. Minorities are as much citizens of Pakistan as the Muslims.

  • Teenage Christian bride to stay with ‘kidnapper’, rules court

    Teenage Christian bride to stay with ‘kidnapper’, rules court

    In spite of the parents’ plea seeking the return of their underage girl, the Sindh High Court handed the custody of a 13-year-old Christian girl child to a Muslim who allegedly coerced the teenager into marriage after her abduction and forced conversion.

    Newsday Pakistan, an outlet focused on minority rights, reported the court as saying that Arzoo Raja had converted to Islam and married 45-year-old Ali Azhar out of her own free will; therefore, she was allowed to live with her husband. The court also ordered the police not to arrest Azhar and the other persons nominated in the FIR [First Information Report] by the girl’s family and to ensure the security of the couple.

    Ghazala Shafique, a rights activist based in Karachi, said the Sindh High Court’s refusal to take into account the documented age of Arzoo Raja, 13, and the falsification of documents had shocked the family and the entire Christian community.

    “According to the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) records, Arzoo’s age is 13, as she was born on July 31, 2007,” she said. Sexual intercourse with a girl below the age of 16 is statutory rape and carries a death sentence or a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison in Pakistan.

    This is the second case of forced conversion of underage Christian girls in Karachi in a year. In October 2019, 14-year-old Huma Younas was kidnapped and forcibly converted to Islam, according to reports.

    In Faisalabad, Punjab province, 14-year-old Maira Shahbaz was kidnapped and forcibly married and converted to Islam earlier this year.