இந்து என்றால் அனாதை இல்லத்தில் கூட இடம் கிடையாது - மதவெறியின் உச்சகட்டம்

பாகிஸ்தானில் மூன்று இந்து சிறார்கள், அவர்கள் இந்துக்கள் என்பதால், அனாதை இல்லங்களிலிருந்து துரத்தபப்ட்டுள்ளார்கள்.

இந்தியாவில் எத்தனையோ பணக்காரர்கள் இருந்து என்ன பயன்? பாகிஸ்தானில் இந்துக்களுக்கு ஒரு அனாதை இல்லம் கட்ட முடியாதா?

கேவலம்.

பணக்காரர்கள்தான் வேண்டாம். ஆயிரக்கணக்கான இந்து சேவை நிலையங்கள் இருக்கின்றன. ராமகிருஷ்ண மடம், விவேகானந்தமிஷன், மாதா அமிர்தானந்தமயி இயக்கம் என்று ஆயிரம் இருக்கின்றன.

அவைகளில் ஒன்றுகூட பாகிஸ்தானில் இயங்கவில்லையா? இயங்க விரும்பவில்லையா அலல்து இயங்க அனுமதி மறுக்கப்படுகிறதா?

3 minority kids declined admission by two shelters
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
Narjis Zaidi
Rawalpindi
On the pretext of their religious identity, three minority children without parental care were declined admission by renowned civil society shelters for children in Rawalpindi.

After their admission was turned down, the children were moved to a government shelter for women in Islamabad where discrimination and indifference to children by civil society shelters was condemned by representatives of non-government organisations.

The NGO Management Committee of the Women Centre demanded children’s shelters to review their rules and frame policies in accordance with the constitution and the CRC.

The children affected by the discriminatory policy are Rukhsana, 13, Boota, 12, and Farzana, 9. Their mother died in 1999 when Farzana was one-year-old. Despite poverty and trauma of their mother’s death, the three minors lived with their father in Sahiwal and regularly attended a public school. However, after their father’s second marriage and his migration to Karachi, they had to be on their own. After a few months they joined their elder sister, who works as a domestic helper in Islamabad. The sister’s employers referred the children to two civil society shelters in Rawalpindi but were declined admission.

Shelters that turned down admission to the vulnerable minors are Apna Ghar and SOS Children’s Village, Rawalpindi. Apna Ghar is run by Anjuman-e-Faizul Islam and houses over 1,000 children without parental care. The charity for orphaned children declined admission to Boota because of his religious identity. “We cannot keep a non-Muslim child because this facility is essentially for Muslim male orphans.”

The reason for non-admissibility at the SOS Children’s Village, as stated by their administration, was the absence of necessary arrangement for imparting religious education to a non-Muslim child. Though the charity takes care of thousands of motherless children, support did not come through for Rukhsana and her younger siblings.

Indifference to a child in distress is cruel. Exercising the same choice on the basis of religious differences is a grave violation of human rights. The act was condemned by members of the Women Centre’s management committee. Nahida Mehboob Ilahi, deputy attorney general and current chairperson of Women’s Centre, said that the admission refusal is a violation of the Constitution of Pakistan. The constitution guarantees protection of rights for all children alike without determining their religious or ethnic identity. “They are children and their right to protection has priority over everything else,” she said quoting Article 25 of the Constitution of Pakistan.

Article 25 outlines equality before law and equal protection. Considering that the vast majority of children are placed amongst the weakest and most disadvantaged, what is required, has to go much beyond formal statements and costly media campaigns. It has to go past reports for the donor’s eyes and the assault of holy sermons for giving alms for the destitute and orphans.

“Violations of the basic rights of children is everyday business,” said General Secretary Women Aid Trust. She feared that these violations would go on unnoticed unless the execution of the constitutional guarantee on children’s right to protection is not in place. “Article 25 will only be a quotable quote unless the violation is seen as a crime.”

Back at the Women’s Centre, the children from Sahiwal are getting used to the shelter environment with eleven other children of different ages. “We miss our school,” they told this correspondent trying hard to prove that homelessness can be endured.