LAHORE: Appreciating the initiative taken by the coalition government of the PPP in 2009 to observe Aug 11 as the National Minorities’ Day, carried forward by the PML-N government, the participants in a convention here on Friday pledged to work with all political stakeholders to promote human rights and a peaceful coexistence.

Discussing the naming of Aug 11 as minorities day, the date had symbolic significance as Quaid-i-Azam had highlighted the rights of all religious communities in his inaugural address to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan in 1947. They called upon the federal and provincial governments to include Mr Jinnah’s speech of Aug 11, 1947 in the Constitution.

The participants included Alexander John Malik, Bishop Emeritus, Diocese of Lahore, Barrister Aamir (PPP), Ejaz Chaudhry (PTI), Dr Nausheen Hamid (PTI), retired Col Mubashir Javed, lord mayor of Lahore, Ameerul Azeem( Jamaat-i-Islami), Peter Jacob, executive director Centre for Social Justice, Wajahat Masood , chairperson Centre for Social Justice and Michelle Chaudhry, president Cecil &Iris Chaudhry Foundation.

The participants emphasised the need for inclusion of the minorities in the national mainstream in all tiers of governance and decision-making. Acknowledging that the fundamental rights were enunciated in the Constitution, they drew attention to the human rights’ challenges.

Representing the religious diversity of the country and different shades of opinion, the participants reiterated the message in the Quaid-i-Azam’s speech should be adopted as a guiding document for formulation of the laws and policies in the country. Otherwise, the rights of all minorities would never be properly upheld.

The participants resolved to foster alliances for tackling challenges faced by Pakistan such as religious and social intolerance, discrimination, nepotism, corruption and lack of respect for rule of law. They also demanded a law to provide a definition and grounds for prosecution and punishment for acts of discrimination, particularly on the basis of religion and belief, to effectively implement freedoms and equality guaranteed in articles 20 and 25 of the Constitution.

They said provisions of the Constitution, e.g. Article 41(2), Article 91 (3), Article 203 that are incompatible with fundamental rights should be amended to remove conceptual inconsistencies about equality of rights among the citizens.

The participants in the convention demanded the judgment of the Supreme Court delivered on June 19, 2014, be implemented in letter and spirit.

In this view, the representatives in the convention rejected the draft education policy 2017 for lack of consideration to safeguard in Article 22 as well as Article 20 of the Constitution.

They also made demands regarding a regulatory body for implementation of job quota reserved for religious minorities, an autonomous and independent statutory national council/commission for minorities to be constituted with a mandate to monitor the implementation of rights of minorities.

The convention was organised by Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) in collaboration with National Commission for Justice and Peace (NCJP) and Cecil &Iris Chaudhry Foundation (CICF).

Published in Dawn, August 11th, 2018