Annual report 2015 of the United States commission on international religious freedom has highlighted the menace of sectarian and religious discrimination. Some excerpts of the report are enough to blemish an already blotted image of Pakistan.

The report reads "Pakistan represents one of the worst situations in the world for religious freedom. Pakistan continued to experience chronic sectarian violence targeting Shia Muslims, Christians, Ahmadis and Hindus. Pakistan’s legal environment is particularly repressive due to its religiously discriminatory constitutional provisions and legislation including its blasphemy laws. The government failed to protect citizens, minority and majority alike, from sectarian and religiously motivated violence, and Pakistani authorities have not consistently brought perpetrators to justice or taken action against societal actors who incite violation."

The US State Department’s 2014 country report on human rights has identified extrajudicial and targeted killings, sectarian violence, disappearances, and torture as the most serious human rights problems in Pakistan. The report also notes that "violence, abuse, and social and religious intolerance by militant organisations and other non-governmental actors contributed to a culture of lawlessness in some parts of the country, particularly in Balochistan, Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the federally administered tribal areas. Religious minorities faced a specter of growing violence during the year. They also faced discriminatory laws, societal intolerance, and a lack of accountability for crimes against them."

Since international reports are often dismissed and insinuated as a slander campaign against Pakistan, therefore it would be pertinent to cite annual report of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. The report corroborates these findings. The latest annual report of the HRCP laments "sustained hate campaign against Shias continued, including wall chalking and clerics’ diatribes, branding them infidels and calling for their murder. No efforts were made to proceed against the perpetrators. The political plenipotentiaries who permitted all this and remained reluctant to challenge religious extremists subsequently wondered at the reasons for the surge in fanatical sectarianism in Pakistan."

The Supreme Court of Pakistan also gave a landmark judgment on the plight of minorities. In a suo moto case following the Peshawar Church attack incident, the Supreme Court suggested strict actions to stem violation of fundamental rights of minorities. The verdict reads "we find that the incident of desecration of places of worship of minorities could be warded off if the authorities concerned had taken preventive measures at the appropriate time."

These observations on the indolence and criminal inaction of authorities evoke the horrendous memories of Badami Bagh incident of 2013 when a violent mob torched a Christian neighborhood. The Punjab government admitted in the Supreme Court that the police had deliberately avoided engaging a charged and violent mob, lest it snowballed into a national crisis if a Muslim got killed in the scuffle. The police also admitted that their commanding officer took refuge in a godown when miscreants pelted them with stones. This deplorable cowardice of the police paved way for setting ablaze more than 150 houses of the hapless Christian community by an insane swarm. The Court also asked the government to establish a special police force with professional training to protect the places of worship of minorities.

Not just international community but the highest level national judiciary has also expressed concern on the state of human rights in the country. Despite towering claims by the rulers, sectarian and religious violence continues unabated.

The Pakistani society is imbued with deep-rooted prejudices based on various identities. Pakistani citizens with other faiths are persecuted, stalked and assaulted by extremist elements. This blots the national image in the international community. The human rights record has diverse implications in the contemporary world. Apart from moral obligation, Pakistan is also a signatory to several international instruments that necessitate protection of rights of religious and sectarian minorities.

Wanton pogrom of religious and sectarian minorities is an undeniable reality that has earned ignominy for Pakistan. Perpetrators are customarily masked as unidentified killers, foreign hands and anti-state elements but well known are those who stoked the inferno of sectarian and religious hatred. These elements are not too veiled and they do not mince a word while justifying and glorifying these killings.

Slouchy official efforts to bridle hate speech and hate material are now being resented even by the security establishment. In a recent huddle of top civil and military brass, the chief ministers were urged to take a hard line against seminaries fanning sectarianism. The meeting agreed to discuss a set of laws exclusively meant to deal with sectarianism and it was also suggested that the government should appoint prayer leaders and Quran teachers in mosques which will help the public sector to remain engaged with mosques and seminaries. The concern was also echoed in another meeting held on May 27 this year. In the meeting, the military leadership expressed dissatisfaction on lackluster implementation of national action plan.

The areas requiring greater attention were foreign funding of seminaries and terrorist groups, proscribed organisations and sectarian groups, hate speech and madrassa reforms. Sensing the mood of security establishment, the federal government convened a meeting of representatives of different seminaries where the message was conveyed unequivocally that now state will take action against those who blame anyone as infidel.

Labeling the opponent as infidel and liable to be killed is not a recent phenomenon. In fact Mohmmad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, was the first one dubbed as infidel by Majlis-i-Ahrar before partition. Maulana Mazhar Ali Azhar’s poetic pejoratives for Jinnah are well known. The report of the court to enquire into the Punjab disturbances of 1953 disclosed that Maulana Mazhar was audacious enough to assert before the court that he still held the same views about Jinnah. The report made frequent references about the routinely aired hate speeches and the tepid official response during formative years of the country. Page 17 of the report reads "according to the view propounded by the leading ulama before us (the court of inquiry) the punishment for apostasy (irtidad) in Islam is death. If, therefore, Ahmadis are kafirs, a person becomes an Ahmadi renders himself liable to the capital punishment. The report later mentions that Maulana Shabbir Ahmad Usmani, a scholar of Deoband, wrote a pamphlet "Ash-shahab". The first part of this document was devoted to establishing that Ahmadis were apostates (murtads) and the second to provide that the appropriate penalty in Islam for apostasy is death.

After the partition, Maulana Usmani became Sheikh-ul-Islam-i-Pakistan and the pamphlet was reprinted with his permission. Ahrars used this pamphlet as a fatwa during the campaign to declare Ahmadis infidel. Once rabidly against Muslim League and Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the Ahrars were astute enough to pay allegiance to Muslim League, pronounce loyalty to Pakistan and support for Kashmir jihad.

Chaudhri Zafarullah Khan, who was appointed as the first foreign minister by Jinnah himself, was at the crosshair of the Ahrar movement. Removing him from the position became the key demand of the vilification campaign in 1950s. Hate speech became a norm at that time and in spite of repeated reminders from intelligence agencies, no perceptible action was taken.

Indolent attitude of the decision makers can be judged from a note written by the adviser for law said, "Ahrars were not advocating violence in their speeches but merely attacking the Ahmadiya faith, a course which was popular with the average Muslim." This kind of servile endorsement to hate speech ultimately culminated in a complete breakdown of law and order and the country witnessed first martial law in 1953.

When Ahmadis were constitutionally pronounced non-Muslims, it was trepidation of a draconian future course for all other faith-based minorities. Ever since, venomous outpouring has pervaded every corner of the country. Hate speech is no more considered as an incrementing offence. From rostrums to textbooks every avenue of expression and indoctrination was used to infuse society with repugnance for different views. This free flow of hate speech gave birth to splenetic contingents of sanctimonious brigades in society. Eventually hate became a key driver of the society that dominated every sphere of life from internal security to foreign policy.

Scorning others on the basis of ethnic identity and religious faith eventually sprawled to sectarian beliefs. Edifice of contemporary Pakistani society has been erected on the foundation of repulsion. The Frankenstein of hate has now gone haywire. Exigency of inoculating society against virulent hate needs a valiant political will at all levels that is not confined to ephemeral cosmetic measures. The uphill task involves deconstruction and reconstruction of the society that may take years.