The Insanity behind Anti-Blasphemy Laws Takes another Life In Pakistan: Islamist Extremists Have Complete Impunity
By Mujahid Hussain, New Age Islam
9 May 2014
The cold blooded
murder of Rashid Rehman in Multan is a shocking example of violence
perpetrated in the name of religion. It shows the powerful presence of
religious extremists in the country who enjoy complete impunity. What
led to the brutal killing of Rashid Rahman was merely his being an
advocate of a man who is accused of blasphemy. Since people in Pakistan
generally perceive of an advocate as a supporter of the accused, the
religious extremists, who commit mindless acts of violence, killed the
advocate who did nothing wrong and was just providing legal assistance
to the accused who is still a suspect, not a criminal.
Let us not forget that
this is not an isolated event in Pakistan. A former judge, Arif Iqbal
Bhatti was also brutally killed because he did not sentence the accused
to death in a fake case of blasphemy. The religious extremists in
Pakistan went to the extent of burning alive an insane person accused of
blasphemy, while the Islamic Sharia does not allow it, particularly
when the accused has lost his senses.
I vividly remember one
such obnoxious incident that took place in Gujranwala in 1996. Dr.
Farooq Ahmad, a Hafiz-e-Quran (Memoriser of the holy Quran), was taken
from the police custody and mercilessly beaten to death and then his
dead body was burnt by religious vigilantes in Gujranwala on the false
accusation that he had desecrated the holy Quran. The deceased was an
Ata’ee (God-gifted) doctor, so when he was accused of desecrating the
holy Quran, a madrasa student made an announcement from the loudspeaker
of the mosque saying: “The vicious Ata’ee doctor has committed the
desecration of the holy Quran”. But the people mistook in hearing and
took the word Ata’ee (God-gifted) as Isa’ee (Christian)
and got provoked so much that they beat the Hafiz-e-Quran (Memoriser of
the holy Quran) to death and burnt his dead body.
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