ISLAMABAD: Represen-tatives of various religions, including parliamentarians, educationalists and scholars, on Tuesday unanimously agreed promoting culture of tolerance, forbearance and acceptance of other religions in the society as pluralism is the key for a vibrant society. Speaking at a conference on social cohesion and integration of non-Muslim citizens of Pakistan titled: ‘United for Promoting Peace and Interfaith Harmony’, they said hatred was the common enemy of the society. “The education policy must be revisited as hate material exists in the existing curricula, polluting the minds of innocent students,” they said. The conference was organised by Bahria University, Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony, BARGAD and others. Chief guest on the occasion was Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony Senior Joint Secretary Ilyas Khan. The speakers said that only the continuity of democracy, democratic values guarantee religious freedom, pluralism in a society. The speakers agreed that the education policy should be revised by removing hate material from it as a country could not progress without granting equal rights to minorities. They said that the change of behaviour was not possible without educating religious scholars to respect other religions. MNAs Asiya Nasir, Robina Khursheed Alam, Asfanyar Bhandara and Tara Singh, Ibrarul Haq, Mehar Dad, Sabiha Shaheen, PIPS ED Zaarullah and others also spoke on the occasion. MNA Shehryar Afridi read out the 21 point joint declaration, stating that the word ‘minority’ should be encouraged to promote inter-faith harmony through performing cultural activities, arts, seminars, workshops, conferences and documentaries. “The religious sentiments of all the communities are important and reciprocal for each other. Such social and religious reciprocity requires mutual respect and tolerance in the subjectivity of faith,” he said. “All citizens, irrespective of their faith shall have the protection of right to property, education, family, faith, right to profess and practice their religion and right to employment sans discrimination,” the participants said. “Religious hate speeches must be discouraged and shall be penalised under Anti-Terrorism Act 1997 by considering them crimes against state,” the participants said. “Heads of local governments should be given justice of peace powers to mitigate interfaith segregations and polarizations. All institutions of state shall discourage faith based discrimination and persecution. None should be allowed to defame Pakistan and its ideological norms on the basis of differences of faith,” they said. Blasphemous material: The National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication met on Tuesday and expressed its displeasure with the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) for not attending the meeting. The members also criticised the FIA for failing to inform them about steps taken to control blasphemous material on the social media. The meeting was held under the chairmanship of Syed Ali Raza Abidi. The meeting was briefed by Pakistan Telecommunication (PTA) chairman about the actions taken by the authority against blasphemous material on social media. However, no FIA official was present to provide details about the steps taken by the agency against blasphemous material on social media. The committee expressed displeasure over the FIA for not attending the meeting and directed that the authority officials must attend the next meeting and brief the committee about the blasphemous material on social media. The departmental representative from Universal Services Fund (USF) briefed the committee about their performance during the financial year 2017-18. Published in Daily Times, October 25th 2017.