August 13, 2022
Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD
Advisor to Prime Minister and Chairman Pakistan Ulema Council Allama Tahir Mahmood Ashrafi has said that forced marriages and forced conversions of religion are ‘not allowed in Islam’, and that various successive incidents of religion based terrorism in India had begin to provoke Pakistan as well.
He made this statement while addressing a national dialogue organized by the Center for Research and Dialogue in Islamabad. The Vice President of Shia Ulama Council of Pakistan Allama Arif Hussain Wahidi, Sirat Chair of Allama Iqbal Open University Professor Dr. Sahibzada Sajid Rehman, Director of Peace and Development Foundation Rumana Bashir, Leader of Hindu Community Advocate Rohit Kumar, and Digital Media Alliance for Pakistan attended the event. President of DigiMAP Sabukh Syed also spoke on the occasion.
However he added, that India has become a living hell for minorities because of the inhumane and cruel treatment of religious minorities there.
Hafiz Tahir Mahmood Ashrafi said that Islam and the Constitution of Pakistan gave equal rights to all citizens, however in India the situation was becoming worse.
“No one will be allowed to spread religious hatred,” said Ashrafi. “In Pakistan there has been a change in the extremist tendencies in the country to a large extent, but it will still take time to completely eradicate them.”
Ashrafi said that when enemies of Pakistan failed to spread sectarianism in Muharram, they began spreading conspiracies to break the relationship of trust between the Pakistan Army and its citizens.
“The recent incident of insulting the holy figures in India are a well-thought-out conspiracy,” he said. “The Modi government is destroying peace by creating a provocative atmosphere in the region with such actions. This time this behaviour by India had also been strongly disapproved by Muslim countries of the world.”
He added that the Modi government was strengthening extremist groups by insulting religions so that they could strengthen their own extremist narrative.
Allama Arif Hussain Wahidi said that in order to keep the nation united, it was necessary to move towards dialogue. The Holy Qur’an has a clear command not to do any infighting. He seconded Ashrafi and said there were various conspiracies against Pakistan at this time.
He said such discussions were necessary for such discussions, dialogues and national unity. He said that In Pakistan, all schools and classes were targeted by terrorism, the current situation of the country is based on negative thinking, when the rulers and the opposition will continue the negative thinking, where could the people go.
Professor Dr. Sahibzada Sajidur Rehman, Head of Sira Chair in Allama Iqbal University, said that forced marriages could not be allowed in Islam, but if someone accepted Islam of his or her own free will, they should not be stopped.
Rumana Bashir said that there are debates in society but no dialogues. but humanity wins in dialogues.R
Advocate Rohit Kumar said that Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s speech on August 11, 1947 clearly said, ‘you are free to go to your places of worship.’
“We as minorities have always played our part in the development of Pakistan, and we have no quarrel with the majority community of our country The few evil or extremist elements in our society need to be brought to justice, extremism weakens the society and needs to be rooted out.
