Daily Times

As the Christian community in Peshawar mourns the ruthless murder of a revered priest, one can’t help but question the hollowness of us sloganeering the national unity. Since some armed motorcyclists had the audacity to target Father William Siraj on a supposedly heavily patrolled Ring Road, that too, on the heels of a hand-grenade attack on policemen while the murder investigation of another religious scholar is underway-all in the same killing ground-there remain no qualms about the shambolic law and order in the megacity. That violence is being stoked using the repulsive religion card further adds to the sting and is quite the reason for the fast-fading white portion of the flag to turbo-charge the pursuit for other options. The spate of targeted killings has continued for quite some time now, where the murder of a Sikh medicine practitioner had even caught the attention of India last year; leading to calls for immediate action from the highest echelons of power. A year earlier, the unforgivable sin of buying a house in the Muslim neighbourhood had landed members of a Christian family in a hospital, and the less said about the instantaneous unleashing of the blasphemy card at the slightest arguments, the better for our absurd self-appreciation.

Amid fears of an international uproar, the police might be under pressure to wind up the investigation in the earliest and do some naming-and-shaming as a feel-good measure. But come whatever cock-and-doodle tales may, the writing on the wall refuses to lose its lustre: attacked from all corners, the life of a minority is the hardest to safeguard in a country like Pakistan. Raising banners for the sake of religious communities in India and the Muslims suffering from the so-called Western wrath, we conveniently forget how many around us have to walk on broken shards of glass every day. An overwhelming majority does not even dream of raising their societal status; improving their financial picture because of the fears of a thousand prejudicial mountains they would have to climb. Even the extremely fortunate ones that do, still practice caution; trying hard to stay away from any bullet gone astray. If this is the picturesque cohesion our founding fathers had dreamed of, it would have been wise to opt for an all-green rectangular flag seven decades earlier. Rest in Peace, Father William. May your passing be the last such act of terrorism committed against members of your community and your country. We, at Daily Times, at the expense of sounding repetitive, stand steadfast in our fight for the protection of all Pakistanis: no matter their caste; no matter their creed; no matter their gender; no matter their beliefs. *