A conference on ‘Collective efforts for advancing diversities’ was held, eve of Pakistan’s Mi-norities Day.
A number of speakers representing religious and civil society groups addressed the ga-thering. One of them was Bishop Indrias Rehmat of Faisalabad who said that “disparities of rights in policies and laws can never ensure equality of status and treatment.”
For the prelate and the other participants, the government has failed to take seriously the pro-blems minorities face, noting that quotas for minorities are a futile attempt to ensure political, reli-gious, social and economic equa-lity if they do not have proper enforcement mechanisms.
According to various sources, Ahmadis, Christians, Hindus, Sikhs and Shias are the most discriminated in Pakistan, a country of 212 million inhabi-tants, in which ethnic Punjabis and Sunni Muslims are the largest groups.
Catholics and Protestants number around 2 million each (just under 1 per cent of the popu-lation respectively).
Rizwan Ullah Kokab, who teaches history at the Government College University, points out that Pakistan is a land of many religions and different cultures. For this reason, the authorities’ “ethnocentric” approach is not useful to the cause of national unity.