Minority Ahmadiyya community being openly targeted in Pakistani city

Faisalabad (Pakistan), June 9(ANI): Pamphlets inciting people to publicly attack members of the Ahmadiyya community, a religious minority group in Pakistan, are being openly and widely circulated in Punjab's textile industry hub, Faisalabad.

The pamphlets, which bear the name of the All-Pakistan Students Khatm-e-Nubuwat Federation, are being handed out at all main shopping plazas and important commercial centres in the city, The Express Tribune reports.

The pamphlet says: "To shoot such people is an act of jihad and to kill such people is an act of sawab."

The pamphlet contains a list of names of Ahmadi industrialists, doctors and business houses. The first name on the list is that of a cloth house, whose three owners were gunned down in a brazen attack last year.

Reacting sharply over the distribution of such hate literature, Umoor-e-Aama Jama'at Ahmadiyya, Faisalabad, said that the propaganda campaign is being carried out unhindered by some fanatic religious groups under the patronage of law-enforcing agencies and the provincial government.

In an email addressed to the Punjab Home Secretary, the police chief and Faisalabad's regional police officer, Jama'at Secretary Mahmood Ahmad wrote: "We have time and again approached police authorities against hate literature but nothing has been done so far. This collapse of law and order can be traced to the cowardice, inefficiency and incompetence of law enforcement agencies."

Ahmad pointed out that it is easy to trace the pamphlet's source, as its publisher's mobile number is brazenly given in print, which also shows the publisher's disdain towards Pakistan's laws and the agencies enforcing them.

"Our mouths have been taped shut. Our hands have been tied. I am writing this in the hope that somewhere somehow this letter finds its way to a patriotic police or other official who takes a fearless stand for the sake of Pakistan," the email said.

Corroborating the view expressed by Ahmad, police officials seemed reluctant to take the matter seriously.

City police chief Rai Tahir Hussain said that he had no information about the pamphlets, and Faisalabad DSP Mian Khalid also pleaded ignorance on the matter, saying that the Kotwali SHO would have the information.

When contacted, SHO Malik Muhammad Shahid said that there was no question of taking action since no complaint has been made in this regard. (ANI)