Coerced religious conversion in Pakistan

Protest against forced conversion of Hindu girls conducted by Pakistan Hindu Council

In Pakistan, people belonging to the minority Hindu, Christian, and Sikh communities are often kidnapped and forcefully converted or coerced through societal pressures to convert to Islam. Some of these victims are allegedly as young as 12 years old. Forbes reported that the Human rights organizations estimates that every year 1,000 such girls are forcibly converted to Islam. This estimate could be even higher than 1,000 as many cases remain unreported. The 2020 US media report also estimates the number of forcibly converted girls to be around 1,000 per year. Jürgen Schaflechner, a cultural anthropologist specializing on Hindus in Pakistan, cautions that these conversions are rarely motivated by religious zeal, and are instead a consequence of the commodification of women, and of denying agency to women in a deeply patriarchal society.

Causes

A Pakistani journalist, writing in an Indian newspaper, alleged that "Wealthy Muslim farmers see [Hindu girls] as fair game for abductions, rape, and prolonged sexual exploitation in captivity. Some notorious religious establishments proudly validate these alleged crimes. State institutions, the police and politicians have encouraged the trend by looking the other way." He claimed that madrassas back it with the connivance of the Government, which failed to protect its citizens.

Some Islamic institutions and clerics have been alleged to be involved in coercing religious minorities to convert to Islam by threatening to harm or withhold economic opportunities to members or minority groups who refuse to convert .

Some coerced conversions are results of kidnappings or violent threats while others are due to the systemic discrimination that many Hindus face in their professional, public, and private lives, and conversion is seen by many as a way to avoid religious discrimination and violence.

According to some child protection activists, the forced conversion of young girls is part of a moneymaking scheme involving corrupt public and religious figures who allow underaged girls to be converted to islam and married to older men in exchange for money.

The Pakistan Muslim League politician Haresh Chopra has stated that abduction and forced conversion of Hindus and Sikhs girls is a business in Pakistan done by organized gangs of mullahs and terrorists.

The culprits involved in forcibly converting a non-Muslim girl to Islam believe that they will earn a place in heaven, according to the Amarnath Motumal, vice chairperson of the Sindh Chapter of Pakistan's Human Rights Commission. Pakistan doesn't have strong legislation to prevent forced conversions and due to this these forced conversions go unabated.

Notable incidents

On 18 October 2005, a Hindu couple residing in the Punjab Colony, Karachi, Sindh returned home to find that their three teenaged daughters had disappeared and the couple discovered that their daughters had been taken to a local madrassah converted to Islam, and were denied unsupervised contact with their parents.

In May 2007, Christian citizens of Charsadda (a city which is close to the border with Afghanistan) reported that they had received letters threatening violent attacks if they did not convert to Islam, and that the police were not taking the threats seriously.

A total of 57 Hindus converted in Pasrur during May 14–19, 2010 and on May 14, 2010, 35 Hindus of the same family were forced to convert by their employer because his sales dropped after Muslims started boycotting his eatable items as they were prepared by Hindus and were persecuted by the Muslim employees of neighbouring shops according to their relatives. Since the impoverished Hindus had no other way to earn and needed to keep the job to survive, they converted. 14 members of another family converted on May 17, 2010 since no one was employing them and later another Hindu man and his family of eight converted under coercion from Muslims to avoid their land from being grabbed.

In April 2012 three Hindu sisters were allegedly threatened into converting to Islam. their cases were appealed all the way to the Supreme Court of Pakistan, where the appeal was admitted but has remained unheard.

Alleged forced conversions of girls belonging to the Kalash community were also reported in 2016.

Sikhs in Hangu district stated they were being coerced to convert to Islam by the assistant commissioner of Tall Tehsil, in December 2017. However, the Deputy Commissioner of Hangu denied it occurred and claimed that Sikhs were offended during a conversation with the assistant commissioner though it was not intentional. In 2017, the Sikh community in Hangu district of Pakistan's Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province alleged that they were "being forced to convert to Islam" by a government official and the residents of Doaba area are being tortured religiously. According to reports, about 60 Sikhs of Doaba had demanded security from the administration.

In July, 2021 over 60 Hindus were forcibly converted to Islam in Mirpur Khas District and Mithi areas of Sindh.

According to the Pakistan Hindu Council religious persecution, especially forced conversions, remains the foremost reason for migration of Hindus from Pakistan. This practice is being reported increasingly in the districts of Tharparkar, Umerkot and Mirpur Khas in Sindh.

According to the Child Protection activists, these forced conversions money-making network which involves Islamic clerics who solemnize the marriages, magistrates who legalize the unions and corrupt local police who aid the culprits by refusing to investigate or sabotaging investigations. According to the Child Protection activist Jibran Nasir, these forced conversions are part of a mafia that preys on vulnerable minority girls for older men with pedophilia urges. The Pakistan Muslim League politician Haresh Chopra has stated that abduction and forced conversion of Hindus and Sikhs girls is a business in Pakistan done by organized gangs of mullahs and terrorists.

Hindus may convert to Islam in order to acquire Watan Cards (a cash transfer programme by the Government of Pakistan to transfer money to flood affected people) and National Identification Cards. Some converts are also given land and money.

Consequences

Hindus in Sindh live in fear, due to forced marriage of Hindu girls to Muslim men. Many Pakistani Hindus migrate to India due to forced conversions.

A survey conducted by a Pakistani Hindu organization found that a majority of scheduled caste Pakistani Hindu families dont send their female children to schools due to the fear of forced conversion and kidnapping.

According to Ramesh Kumar Vankwani, a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan, around 5,000 Hindus migrate from Pakistan to India every year due to fear of forced conversions. The Pakistan Hindu Council says that forced conversions are the primary reason for the declining Hindu population in Pakistan.

Legality

Dalit Sujag Tehreek protesting against forced conversion of Dalit Hindu girls

Pakistan lacks strong laws prohibiting coerced conversions, which has drawn criticism for allowing coerced conversions to go largely unpunished.

In November 2016, a bill prohibiting forced conversion was passed by the Sindh Provisional Assembly however, the Governor of Sindh faced pressure from muslim groups not to sign the bill, leading to it not becoming a law. In 2020 a bill aimed at preventing coerced conversions was introduced in the Senate of Pakistan that could prevent forced conversions of minority girls, but it was turned down by the Senate Standing Committee on Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony. Krishna Kumari Kolhi, a Hindu Pakistan Peoples Party Senator, walked out of the Senate during the meeting as a form of protest.

Response

Protest against forced conversion of Christian girls in Pakistan organised by NCJP

The Pakistani Nobel Laurette Malala Yousafzai spoke against forced conversions in Pakistan and said "It should be a personal choice and no one, especially a child shouldn’t be forced to accept any faith or convert to any other religion out of the will," The Pakistani Prime minister Imran Khan has said that forced conversions are 'un-Islamic' and are against the commands of Allah.

Candice Bergen, the Deputy Leader of Conservative Party of Canada, has commented that "The reports coming out of Pakistan of Christian and Hindu girls being abducted, raped, forced into marriages and coerced to convert from their faith are deeply concerning and need to be addressed". She also called for the re-establishment of Office of Religious Freedom in Canada to address the issue.

In January 2023, experts from the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights expressed their alarm at the reported rise in kidnappings, coerced religious conversions and wedding of underaged females from among religious minorities in Pakistan. They appealed the Government of Pakistan to stop the alleged abuse where people in their teens had been “kidnapped from their families, trafficked … far from their homes (and) made to marry men sometimes twice their age”.

See also

• Asia Bibi blasphemy case
• Freedom of religion in Pakistan
• Religion in Pakistan