Finding Answers

Chela Ram Kewlani, who belongs to a business family from Jamshoro and was president of the Pakistan Hindu Council and is a leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf in Sindh, was appointed Chairman of the new Commission. Until two months after the formation of the Commission, Chela Ram Kewlani had not visited any Hindu or Christian locality in Pakistan to understand the situation of the minorities. The densely Hindu populated areas of Sindh such as Hyderabad and Mirpurkhas and Christian populated areas like Gujranwala, Sialkot, Okara, Faisalabad, etc. seemed to be ignored by the Chairman.

Chela Ram Kewlani is from a Hindu community that represents 20% of the Hindu population in Pakistan. It may be noted that no male or female from the Hindu Scheduled Castes in Pakistan was given an official or unofficial position for representation of the 80% Hindus in the country.

Unfortunately, the reasons which led Jogindar Nath Mandal to leave Pakistan are still relevant. Scheduled Caste Hindus are ignored or are exploited by the government. In recent years, the Government of Pakistan organized a census of the country’s population. In the census, the Scheduled Castes was shown as a separate religion instead of being represented as Scheduled Caste Hindus. They were mentioned as being from a different religion. This caused misrepresentation of the actual figures and people from Scheduled Caste Hindu communities were bound to declare themselves as just Hindus instead of being Scheduled Caste Hindus due to the lack of awareness.

There are Scheduled Caste Hindus in large numbers in many rural and urban areas in Pakistan. They include Ad dharma, Bengali, Barar, Bawaria, Bazigar, Bhangi, Bhanjra, Bhil, Chamar, Charan, Chuhroar Balmiki, Chanal, Dagiand Koli, Dhanak, Dhed, Dumna, Gangra, Gandhila, Halakhor, Jatia, Jogi, Khatik, Kori, Kalal, Kolhi, Kuchria, Marecha/ Mareja, Meghwar, Menghwar, Nat, Odh, Parsi, Parna, Ramdasi, Sami, Sansi, Sapela, Sarera, Shikari, Sirkiband, Sochi, and Wagri.

Upper caste Hindus have a limited population and mostly live in the urban areas. They include Maheshwari, Lohana, Warnya, Deewans, Brahmins and Thakurs.

Though the National Commission for Minorities was formed at the federal level, no mechanism came forth to form bodies at the provincial level. This signified that the Chairman had not been empowered to act for the minorities at any other level except the federal level. The Commission was, all the same, instructed to promote peace and interfaith harmony within the communities. These were areas in which several NGOs, INGOs and other human rights organizations from Hindu, Muslim and Christian communities were already working.

Issues that needed proper focus for the development of minorities in the country were such concerns as forced conversions, abduction of young girls, murder of people from the minority communities, lack of a proper mechanism for registration of FIRs, land-grabbing, child marriages and lack of education. The majority of the members of the Commission have past affiliations with the government. This raises questions about their earlier performance. It was being asked that if they were not able to do anything on previous occasions, how could they be expected to improve their performance now?

According to the BBC, on an average, 20 girls belonging to the minority communities were reported to have been abducted every month and then converted, whereas several cases went unreported. In any event, no woman from the Hindu community was asked to join the new Commission to highlight such cases. Two members from the Muslim community were also asked to join the Commission but no non-Muslim was included in the Council of Islamic ideology and this also appeared to be contradictory. It was also obvious that the government at the provincial, national and senate levels had completely ignored the active workers in the Christian and Hindu communities for inclusion in the Commission. They only chose upper caste persons.

Another anamoly in the formation of the National Commission for Minorities was that Islamilies, Bahais, Buddhists and Ahmadis, who are also considered to be minority groups in Pakistan and are in a greater number than Parsis and the Kalash community, were ignored for membership of the Commission.

The Government needs to consult NGOs for more accurate development of data concerning the minorities; women from the marginalized communities and arid zones must also be given representation on the Commission. People from the neglected communities among the Hindus and Christians must be given priority at the national level to highlight their problems. Denial of such representation will render the Commission toothless.