'Minorities have not entirely been integrated in the society because of the brutal exclusive attitude towards their basic needs.' -Photo by: Nosheen Abbas

'And because I am happy and dance and sing, they think they have done me no injury, and are gone to praise God and his priest and king, who make up a heaven of our misery.'
         –William Blake

Walking past their tents, it felt like watching an eerie live slideshow. The first tent is empty with a few pots and pans piled up neatly next to a makeshift fire. In the next tent, two children are perched on a charpoy, sharing food. The tent after that is covered by bed sheets for privacy, but one can hear the conversations of women. Their houses are made of tarpaulin, bed sheets and sticks.

Their makeshift houses quiver as cars zoom by on both sides of the green strip island where they now live. There are hundreds of poor Christian families – men, women and children, living day and night for four months under flimsy sheds and covers on the island between two roads in G-7. Right till the end of the undulating road as far as I can see, the green island is lined with tattered tents which looks like a long mutated caterpillar.

At the very head of the road is a family sitting on a charpoy. They narrate their story of abuse at the hands of the Chak Shahzad police during an operation on October 18 2008 which they consider was sub judice. Former federal Minister and convener of the World Minorities Alliance J. Salik says it is not clear who exactly gave orders for the operation.

A day before the operation he says the heads of various departments were changed. 'The deputy commissioner, the chairman of Capital Development Authority and the head of the Chak Shahzad police station were all changed.'
 
Police used tear gas against women, children and men fumigating them out of their homes. A woman shows her four-year-old child’s skull which has bald patches caused by the intense tear gas. Zeenat, whose husband, Bashir, had died during the operation, is carrying her grand son who has developed a pot belly caused by malnutrition.

Another woman who has almost comic like stitch on her chin narrates how they were beaten by male and female police personnel with sticks, kicked, punched and their heads yanked back as they pulled their hair. The police then kept 47 women captive for over 24 hours.

Former federal minister J. Salik and MNA Babar Awan, however, were able to at least get the women released from the police custody. In protest, they all walked from Chak Shahzad to the National Press Club that night.

Sitting in a circle old and young men and women tell their experience of mistreatment by the police. The cemented platform where we are sitting is surrounded by tents from all three sides: the back faces a ground where they hang their clothes.

Below the platform are a few children showering, a young girl washing clothes and a boy drinking water, all from the same broken pipeline. The water stream is dotted with garbage and wrappers. A little girl looks up vacantly as she leans on her sister who is washing clothes.

A woman tells me how each family has only one earning member, that most have lost their jobs because of protests and meetings that they have had to collectively attend. 'I am a patient of diabetes. I don’t have enough money to get medicines and everyone is getting ill over here,' a 72-year-old man with yellow tinged eyes says. 'On rainy days, we don’t sleep at all,' says a woman.

People from neighboring houses have been kind enough to provide with them water, space to wash clothes and take baths. According to them the neighboring slum dwellers haven’t been as helpful.

Hector Haleem, now in jail, had taken money from more than 3,000 poor Christian community members for providing them land at the Rawal Lake side. The Water and Sanitation Agency of Rawalpindi claims that the land belongs to the civic agency and the Christian community members have occupied it illegally.

The authorities have not procured the money of the poor families from the accused. It’s probably correct that the land wasn’t theirs, but one can see their misery. It cannot be ignored that these poor and largely illiterate families were duped by land grabbers and the government has done nothing for those languishing in the middle of the road for four months now.

If billions taken by the rich, factory owning and influential people can be written off, can funds not be generated and spared for the poor marginalized people? The government owes them a roof over their heads, and if at all they deserve this punishment, then the government and the municipal authorities owe them and their community an explanation because this is an obvious humanitarian problem.

Minorities have not entirely been integrated in the society because of the brutal exclusive attitude towards their basic needs. Former law minister and current head of HRCP also says that 99 per cent cases against minorities stem from property issues.

The former government had announced to regularize all katchi abadis and give property rights to minorities who have been living in slum areas for generations but the announcements have proved to be mere lip service.

It’s ironic that when Pakistan was made it was done so against the oppression of biased laws- yet perhaps we have forgotten what it feels like to be an underdog. Minorities in Pakistan face prejudices in the spheres of academic, social and professional life. This time it is not the fanatic extremists who have created an airtight space for them, but the government itself that has turned its back on those who have no place even under the bare sky.

nosheenabbas@gmail.com