December 25 is special for Pakistan as it marks the birth anniversary of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah and, by coincidence, coincides with Christmas, a sacred day for the country’s Christian citizens. This overlap is more than a quirk of the calendar. It serves as a yearly reminder of the moral foundations on which Pakistan was envisaged. In his most frequently cited address to the Constituent Assembly on August 11, 1947, Jinnah articulated a vision of citizenship that was strikingly modern for its time: the state, he said, had no business with the religion of its citizens, and all were free to go to their places of worship.
As every year, this Quaid Day has also arrived with a fanfare of inclusivity. Official statements and ceremonial gestures are once again expected to emphasise interfaith harmony and constitutional equality. Such affirmations are welcome. They reflect an awareness, at least at the level of symbolism, that Pakistan’s minorities are an integral part of the national fabric and that their protection is not a concession but a constitutional obligation. Punjab’s government has been especially eager to demonstrate solidarity. It has already sponsored grand Christmas lighting and a 42-foot-tall Christmas Tree in Lahore, among interfaith harmony rallies. Officials boast of a 300% increase in the provincial minority affairs budget and new welfare “minority cards” to aid poor non-Muslim families.
Yet symbolism alone cannot substitute for substance. Pakistan’s Christian community–estimated at around one to two per cent of the population–continues to face structural disadvantages that ceremonial goodwill does little to alleviate. Our religious minorities are disproportionately represented in low-paid and hazardous occupations, a legacy of social exclusion rather than choice. More seriously, the persistent misuse of blasphemy laws, coupled with weak safeguards against false accusations, has created an atmosphere of fear.
There is also the unresolved contradiction within Pakistan’s constitutional framework. While Article 25 promises equality before the law, other provisions explicitly bar non-Muslims from holding the offices of president and prime minister. These exclusions institutionalise a hierarchy of citizenship that sits uneasily with Jinnah’s stated commitment to equality and with Pakistan’s obligations under international human rights norms.
If December 25 is to mean more than ritual remembrance, it must prompt honest national reflection. Honouring the Quaid does not lie in speeches alone, nor in seasonal displays of interfaith camaraderie. It lies in the hard work of reform: strengthening legal protections for places of worship, ensuring accountability in cases of religiously motivated violence, revisiting discriminatory laws, and investing in education that counters prejudice rather than reproducing it.
Pakistan’s younger generations (Muslim and non-Muslim alike) will judge the sincerity of official commitments not by what is said on commemorative days, but by what they experience in classrooms, courts and workplaces throughout the year. December 25 should therefore serve as a reminder of unfinished business: the task of aligning the republic more closely with the inclusive vision articulated at its birth. *