Pakistan is not a country known to be kind toward its minorities. A US state department report in 2014 noted that mob violence against minority groups, and police torture of religious dissidents was prevalent across Pakistan. The country’s strict blasphemy law, which puts Pakistan’s minorities at the receiving end of fundamentalist violence, has a history of causing assassinations and provoking terrorist attacks by hardline groups.
While it does have a terrible record in protecting its minorities, the current Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N) government of Nawaz Sharif is trying to turn the tables on the country’s critics.
“The day is not far when Pakistan will be recognised as a minorities-friendly country due to steps being undertaken to better the lives of minority groups,” Nawaz Sharif said during a recent visit to an old Hindu temple.
This is not the first time in recent weeks that Pakistan’s government has been seen assuaging its Hindu community, which is the second largest religious group in the predominantly Sunni country. A Senate committee in the first week of January approved a bill which when made into law would legalise Hindu marriage in Pakistan.
We came up with five possible reasons behind Nawaz Sharif, all of a sudden, turning progressive:
To burnish Pakistan’s poor international image
Pakistan is widely associated with terrorism on the international stage, which has created a sense of insecurity in the minds of foreign investors who have wanted to pump money in the subcontinental nation. Pakistan’s crippled economy received just $1.2 billion in the financial year 2015-16, a fraction of $30.9 billion that India received during the same period.
(Source: Youtube/Real Stories)
It is believed that projecting a more progressive image of Pakistan internationally could be a ploy to attract more foreign investment to the crippled economy. At present, Pakistan receives a lion’s share of its foreign inflows from close ally China, which is investing massively in a network of roads and railways across the country, as part of $46 China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).
An aide of Nawaz Sharif told Reuters on Wednesday,”Pakistan’s image, economy, foreign investment, security – they are all interlinked.”
To win the national election in 2018
Another theory that explains Nawaz Sharif’s recent reaching out to minorities claims that the PM is doing it to get them behind his outfit PML-N before next year’s general election. While minorities make up just around three percent of Pakistan’s population, it has been reported that they still wield the power to influence outcomes in certain seats, mainly in the states of Punjab and Sindh.
Traditionally supporters of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), large sections of Pakistan’s minorities reportedly drifted toward Sharif’s conservative PML-N coalition in the last election in 2013.
To improve relations with neighboring India
Bilateral relations between Pakistan and India have been on the downhill since a terrorist attack on an air force base in Pathankot in the state of Punjab at the start of last year, an attack that came just days after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprise stopover in Islamabad on Nawaz Sharif’s birthday.
The gesture by the Indian PM was believed to have pumped great optimism in the then ongoing peace talks, but was unfortunately short-lived. Indian investigators claimed that they had clinching evidence of Pakistan’s security agencies role in supervising the terrorists who carried out the attack, which was denied by Islamabad.
The subsequent unrest in Indian Kashmir in the wake of killing of a separatist commander Burhan Wani by Indian security forces invited further allegations of Pakistan trying to foment insurgency in Kashmir. India blasted Pakistan at the United Nations, with the Modi even expressing solidarity with separatist rebels fighting Islamabad in Balochistan.
(Source: Youtube/PIB India)
In a nutshell, relations between India and Pakistan have been more fractious in recent times than they have ever been. Considering that Sharif knows India’s politics well, his latest overtures to Pakistan’s Hindu community, which has strong historic and emotional links to India, could be an attempt to appeal to the Hindu Nationalist government in neighbouring India to effect a thaw in bilateral relations.
To curb the growing tide of fundamentalism within Pakistan
Fundamentalism has been on the rise in Pakistan in recent years. The radical Islamist ideology is considered one of the root causes behind terrorism, beside some economic factors. According to an estimate, terrorist violence has inflicted Pakistan with losses to the tune of $14.8 billion over the two-year period ending 2016.
(Source: Youtube/Journeyman Pictures)
As another symptom of radical Islamism sweeping Pakistan’s society, mob violence against people and minority communities perceived to have violated the Islamic law has been surging. Most of the fundamentalist charge is led by hardcore Sunni Islamist organisations, which also happen to enjoy a following among public, in the government and military.
Sharif’s latest gestures toward Hindus and other minorities may well be an attempt to distance himself from and discredit these fundamentalist organisations among his supporters, which would also serve to save his own political skin at time of elections.
Nawaz Sharif is a good human being
It is somewhat likely that Nawaz Sharif is personally troubled by violent attacks on country’s minorities and has therefore decided to take a stand.
“In my personal view, we are all are equal – Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Christians – and people belonging to other religions; we are all one,” Sharif was quoted as saying by Reuters news agency. He went on rebuke the Islamic scholars who interpreted Islam to “preach hate” against other religions.
Sharif reportedly also remarked, “I believe this is not lawful. No one should try to teach this sort of lesson, nor should anyone heed such lessons.”
However, Sharif’s moral compunctions don’t hold up to scrutiny, when massive corruption allegations against him are taken into account. He was also the Prime Minister when a huge group of militants backed by Pakistan’s security forces invaded Indian army posts that led to the Kargil War in 1999, casting a further doubt on where his moral compass lies.
(Source: Youtube/BBC Urdu)
