Eight Ahmadi men, including a prayer leader, detained by police for two days, were on Tuesday booked on charges of blasphemy and terrorism.
Gulshan Ravi police had detained seven Ahmadi men after raiding a building on Sunday. The police had tried to placate a group of protesters led by some clerics by registering an FIR under Section-452 of the Pakistan Penal Code (trespass) against an unidentified person.
On Tuesday they registered an FIR against the detained men on the complaint of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Ulema and Mushaikh Wing Joint Secretary Abdul Aziz under section 295-B of the PPC (defiling the Quran) and Section-11W of the Anti Terrorism Act (printing, publishing, or disseminating material to incite hatred).
This is the second such incident this month in Lahore. Earlier an FIR was registered under Sections 295-B, 295-C of the PPC and Section-11W of the Anti Terrorism Act on April 12 at Islampura police station.
Aziz, the complainant, said he was not a witness to the trespass.
The seven Ahmadis who had been detained by police on Sunday were nominated in the FIR. Aziz alleged that some men had entered Usman’s house during the day. As Usman’s family shouted upon seeing them, they turned away and entered a neighbouring building, later found out to be an Ahmadi place of worship. Aziz said a book one of the men had been carrying fell on the ground. It was found to have contained blasphemous content.
Aziz told The Express Tribune that he was a PML-N office bearer. While the FIR nominated eight men who had been detained earlier, Aziz said, he would pressure the police into arresting 15 other Ahmadis who had been present at the place of worship.
Muhammad Hassan Muavia, spokesperson of the Khatam-i-Nabuwat Lawyers Forum, told The Express Tribune that the Forum had succeeded in getting an FIR registered against the Ahmadis. He said the police did not seem keen on prosecuting the Ahmadis but had been successfully pressured into registering the FIR.
He said police had requested the protesters not to nominate five of the seven Ahmadis in police custody, but they had not agreed. “We carried weapons in … Police took away two of our pistols even though we had licences for them,” said Muavia.
Jamaat-i-Ahmadiya Pakistan Spokesperson Saleemudin said the anti-Ahmadiya movement in Lahore was active and strong since attacks on two of their places of worship on May 28, 2010. He said the anti-Ahmadiya elements. He said they enjoyed tacit government support and were guilty of violating human rights.
He said the elements, who have been propagating hatred against the Ahmadiya community, had also attacked a place of worship in Gulshan Ravi. The police, instead of helping them, had branded innocent Ahmadis as terrorists.
“When the mob tried to attack the place, the people inside did not open the door. They called police who then arrested Ahmadis,” Saleemudin said.
The caretaker government, too had turned a blind eye to the anti-Ahmadiya activities in the city, he said.
Published in The Express Tribune, May 1st, 2013.