LAHORE: A number of rights activists and members of civil society on Saturday staged a demonstration in front of the Lahore Press Club to press for the recovery of Raza Khan, a peace educationist who went missing in the city on Dec 2, last year.

They included the father of Mr Khan who pleaded the authorities concerned to have his son located at the earliest.

The activists carried placards demanding the recovery of Mr Khan. Prominent among them were Diep Saeeda of the Institute of Peace and Secular Studies, and Mr Raheemul Haque.

Raza Khan belonged to the Aaghaz-i-Dosti initiative and used to work for peacebuilding between Pakistani and Indian schoolchildren. He also used to annually publish a calendar containing art pieces by six each Indian and Pakistani schoolchildren, and messages by elders.

He went missing on Dec 2 after attending a discussion on Faizabad sit-in at Lowkey Lokai, an office near Garden Town.

The demonstrators said it had been three months since the disappearance of Raza Khan. His family and friends had tried all avenues, including the government, Lahore High Court and Commission of Inquiry of Enforced Disappearances, to bring him back but had thus far been disappointed. There had already been eight hearings of the high court, and one hearing of the commission without any information of his whereabouts, health, why and by whom he was picked up.

They said they see families of the disappeared and civil society protesting in all parts of the country and not a single week goes by without a protest. But the state seems to be unaccountable and above its own law, which will only lead to further insecurity, and restriction of citizen rights of expression and association.

Meanwhile, the Christian community also protested outside the press club calling for a full investigation into the alleged attacks on cousins Sajid and Patras Masih. They stated that even if the suspect was found guilty no person should be treated in this brutal manner.

Under the banner of British Pakistani Christians Association, the protesters called for the “trumped up” charges to be dropped by the judiciary and the Federal Investigation Agency officers involved in violence against the suspects to be sacked and tried.

The protesters were holding placards and shouted slogans against police highhandedness, demanding justice for Sajid Masih. Speakers appealed to the chief justice of Pakistan, army chief and political leadership to consider Christians as Pakistanis and treat them with equal respect as everyone else was. They said due process of law should be followed when someone is alleged to have committed a crime and not slapped with Section 295-C straightaway.

Published in Dawn, March 4th, 2018