Pakistan – Religious tolerance and cultural shift

[k s ahmed]

thank you sir for sharing your analysis. sir i want to share my experience about mullaism. when i was in 8th class then our principal was converted to mullaism. at that time we have to have a tasbih and other stuff in our bags if some thing is missing then our teacher beat us. one day principal came in class and started to listen procedure of namaz and he beat the whole class and at the end he realized that he was wrong. on the other hand i will appreciate those madrassas who give modern education and islamic education. i really want that madrasaa edducation where math astrology was compulsory with fiqh

Jamia tur Rasheed
Or schools such as nakhla

Both are in khi

 

[Maxpane]

Jamia tur Rasheed
Or schools such as nakhla

Both are in khi

they should open the branches of their schools in other cities too

 

[k s ahmed]

they should open the branches of their schools in other cities too

There might be. I don't really know. Or there might be other schools following that model

 

[Maxpane]

There might be. I don't really know. Or there might be other schools following that model

HMM. HOPE OTHER SCHOOLS ALSO FOLLOW THIS MODEL

 

[OldenWisdom...قول بزرگ]

It all started during my first job which was for a world leading financial institution and the posting was in Singapore, my boss was from British aristocracy. Coffee machine was next to my cubicle, few months into the job and came Ramadan after two days my boss calls me up and ask me I haven’t seen you taking coffee for the last two days is everything OK and I told him it was our holy month and we fast during this month and this is for 29 or 30 days and after that we celebrate, same day the coffee machine was moved to a far off place and all my colleagues stopped eating drinking in near my cubicle. Mind you that I hadn’t completely overcome the prejudices which are programmed in our brains from childhood about people of other religions despite 7 years of education in UK and it was only few years after Zia’s death that I went abroad so his version of Islam was in full flow in Pakistan, This gesture was something which moved me deeply that people of other religions the Christians, the Buddhists, and others are giving so much respect to my religious believes, they didn’t stop there they threw eid parties for us and gave us (my family and I) gifts, it was the same when I was transferred out to North America (USA and later Canada) people honored and respect my religious believes.

When we decided to come back to Pakistan we were astonished to find that despite being a Muslim country, with over 90% population of Muslims and despite the fact that Islam by virtue of it philosophy teaches religious tolerance people looked down on other religions, used nasty words about them.

However, lately in the last couple of years it seems we are coming out of the sick, perverted version of Zia and his minion’s religion, as I say we the people pf Pakistan have always been tolerant of people from other nationalities/ethnicities and religions.

Anyways last year was my first year in my current organization, which does give out “Eidi”, “clothes” and eid Mubarak to all staff in the service area, meaning the office boys, the guards, the riders, the cleaning guys, drivers etc. Come Christmas I came to know no such tradition of giving official leave to Christians or “Eidi” for that matter, so I took initiative last year and gave all Christians staff “eidi” from my own pocket and arranged cake cutting in all offices where we had Christian staff and gave them official leave on 24th and 26th, it did not make us Christians if you know contrary to the jahileen who have been sending ridiculous messages on social media, just the way giving my fasting and eid respect did not make my colleagues Muslims.

Somehow or the other company came to know about it and this year the company decided to treat the Christian “eid” as our “eid” and gave away all the usual stuff which is given to all “service staff” on “eids” including the Christians, not only that my usual personal contribution was there and this motivated rest of the staff to pitch in and contribute some money, including cake cuttings. The office in which I myself operate from when we gave the money along cake I clearly saw the chap crying with tears and told us that he was over whelmed as he too had seen the worst the radicals threw at them few years ago. A point to note is that on an average in addition to company’s “Eidi” staff gift to our Christians colleagues (about 10 of them) was around 50K each, the smiles the tears the gratitude were worth a billion rupees.

Best thing was that I did not hear a single complaint from any quarter that why are we doing it for Christians, which led me to believe that we are going back to our roots of tolerance and religious freedom, we are not completely there yet but we are moving towards that. It will not be 100% every human society has its share of radicals but it the general populace that matter and we will Insha’Allah be there. This is the cultural shift which was need of the time, unlike the countries which claim of religious tolerance and yet are at the core extremist, we on the other hand have been labeled by the world as religiously less tolerant and yet we are demonstrating otherwise instead of just words. We are Muslims and we are proud of that, and demonstrating to the world this is how a Muslim society treats its citizens of other religion.

We are not secular and we will never be a secular state, we are Muslims and a Muslim state that's how our religion teaches us to treat people of other religion. Time to take pride in who we are.

@Mangus Ortus Novem , @The Eagle , @Dubious , @Shane

I'm often befuddled by people so thoroughly misled. All those years under British didn't teach locals on how to deal with two tooths. Imagine kids groing up in a politically correct environment, from the very beginning they have been told to not say certain things in front of certain people but in their homes and in front of their own kind or like minded individuals they can drop the charade... such persons when fully grown can lie on your face with a straight face and you'd not have a clue... that is why the orange man was and continues to be such a welcome change ... he lies and concots hatred in front of everyone without caring for any repercussions. Imagine people being always acting awkwardly guarded around you... asking questions that otherwise build upon their stereotype of you but dismissing everything that contradicts it? I like Pakistanis to be genuine most of the time with true smiles but one must be sophisticated enough to read through as well...

 

[Dubious]

It all started during my first job which was for a world leading financial institution and the posting was in Singapore, my boss was from British aristocracy. Coffee machine was next to my cubicle, few months into the job and came Ramadan after two days my boss calls me up and ask me I haven’t seen you taking coffee for the last two days is everything OK and I told him it was our holy month and we fast during this month and this is for 29 or 30 days and after that we celebrate, same day the coffee machine was moved to a far off place and all my colleagues stopped eating drinking in near my cubicle.

Enough Malays/ Muslims in Singapore to know what Ramadan is....British never cease to surprise me with their lack of knowledge despite at 1 point in history controlling a many countries?!

I had a British boss who asked if I spoke Arabic since we spoke it in Pakistan (no idea who gave him that thought...and this guy was PhD graduate and a topper!)

It all started during my first job which was for a world leading financial institution and the posting was in Singapore, my boss was from British aristocracy. Coffee machine was next to my cubicle, few months into the job and came Ramadan after two days my boss calls me up and ask me I haven’t seen you taking coffee for the last two days is everything OK and I told him it was our holy month and we fast during this month and this is for 29 or 30 days and after that we celebrate, same day the coffee machine was moved to a far off place and all my colleagues stopped eating drinking in near my cubicle. Mind you that I hadn’t completely overcome the prejudices which are programmed in our brains from childhood about people of other religions despite 7 years of education in UK and it was only few years after Zia’s death that I went abroad so his version of Islam was in full flow in Pakistan, This gesture was something which moved me deeply that people of other religions the Christians, the Buddhists, and others are giving so much respect to my religious believes, they didn’t stop there they threw eid parties for us and gave us (my family and I) gifts, it was the same when I was transferred out to North America (USA and later Canada) people honored and respect my religious believes.

This has little to do with religion and more to do with basic ethics which somehow is missing in Pakistan!

My family left after Zia's era and we were seen as Zia's Pakistanis by Muslims we met = we know more about Islam (Not sure how that came about).
Our passport was respected = no long queues for American nor Australian visa (Have both on my green passport during the early 90s)
Our people were seen as trustworthy and employed with closed eyes! No fake degree Shenanigan, no fear of twisting laws, no lack of skills!

What happened?

Anyways last year was my first year in my current organization, which does give out “Eidi”, “clothes” and eid Mubarak to all staff in the service area, meaning the office boys, the guards, the riders, the cleaning guys, drivers etc. Come Christmas I came to know no such tradition of giving official leave to Christians or “Eidi” for that matter, so I took initiative last year and gave all Christians staff “eidi” from my own pocket and arranged cake cutting in all offices where we had Christian staff and gave them official leave on 24th and 26th, it did not make us Christians if you know contrary to the jahileen who have been sending ridiculous messages on social media, just the way giving my fasting and eid respect did not make my colleagues Muslims.

Awesome gesture!! Much respect!!

cursing zia is not a solution it was west specially US was behind creating those fanatics for themselves. oh by the way looking only dark spot in our society is not the way.. there are alot of racisem in west either its for race or religion.

He is pointing out a problem and showing a way to solution even if it started in his own office!

If we dont "look at these dark spots" and discuss what to do with them, who will do it for us? Angels from heaven? No, the country is for us and we its people, we need to own that and hence is our responsibility too!

 

[StormBreaker]

Enough Malays/ Muslims in Singapore to know what Ramadan is....British never cease to surprise me with their lack of knowledge despite at 1 point in history controlling a many countries?!

I had a British boss who asked if I spoke Arabic since we spoke it in Pakistan (no idea who gave him that thought...and this guy was PhD graduate and a topper!)


This has little to do with religion and more to do with basic ethics which somehow is missing in Pakistan!

My family left after Zia's era and we were seen as Zia's Pakistanis by Muslims we met = we know more about Islam (Not sure how that came about).
Our passport was respected = no long queues for American nor Australian visa (Have both on my green passport during the early 90s)
Our people were seen as trustworthy and employed with closed eyes! No fake degree Shenanigan, no fear of twisting laws, no lack of skills!

What happened?




Awesome gesture!! Much respect!!

I really get furious whenever on internet i encounter those ranting Gen Zia-ul-Haq’s Islamic policies.

Note this down, these same people if were under Prophet Muhammad SA, would still raise objections.

The principals, laws Sir Zia brought keeping islam in light were just the basic Islamic ethics and requirements.

Take veils, gender segregation, azzan on tv, ethical dressed anchors and the list goes on, these are nothing extremist.

These are something from 1400 years ago which our Prophet conveyed to us.

Look where we are f***g now. Worst in history at the point. Muslims by mere names. I am not calling myself better or less than anyone but intoxicants, adultery, relationships, unethical acts, bribes, interests, everything has been normalized while prayers have been reduced to friday prayers.

Is this even islam ?

 

[waz]

It all started during my first job which was for a world leading financial institution and the posting was in Singapore, my boss was from British aristocracy. Coffee machine was next to my cubicle, few months into the job and came Ramadan after two days my boss calls me up and ask me I haven’t seen you taking coffee for the last two days is everything OK and I told him it was our holy month and we fast during this month and this is for 29 or 30 days and after that we celebrate, same day the coffee machine was moved to a far off place and all my colleagues stopped eating drinking in near my cubicle. Mind you that I hadn’t completely overcome the prejudices which are programmed in our brains from childhood about people of other religions despite 7 years of education in UK and it was only few years after Zia’s death that I went abroad so his version of Islam was in full flow in Pakistan, This gesture was something which moved me deeply that people of other religions the Christians, the Buddhists, and others are giving so much respect to my religious believes, they didn’t stop there they threw eid parties for us and gave us (my family and I) gifts, it was the same when I was transferred out to North America (USA and later Canada) people honored and respect my religious believes.

When we decided to come back to Pakistan we were astonished to find that despite being a Muslim country, with over 90% population of Muslims and despite the fact that Islam by virtue of it philosophy teaches religious tolerance people looked down on other religions, used nasty words about them.

However, lately in the last couple of years it seems we are coming out of the sick, perverted version of Zia and his minion’s religion, as I say we the people pf Pakistan have always been tolerant of people from other nationalities/ethnicities and religions.

Anyways last year was my first year in my current organization, which does give out “Eidi”, “clothes” and eid Mubarak to all staff in the service area, meaning the office boys, the guards, the riders, the cleaning guys, drivers etc. Come Christmas I came to know no such tradition of giving official leave to Christians or “Eidi” for that matter, so I took initiative last year and gave all Christians staff “eidi” from my own pocket and arranged cake cutting in all offices where we had Christian staff and gave them official leave on 24th and 26th, it did not make us Christians if you know contrary to the jahileen who have been sending ridiculous messages on social media, just the way giving my fasting and eid respect did not make my colleagues Muslims.

Somehow or the other company came to know about it and this year the company decided to treat the Christian “eid” as our “eid” and gave away all the usual stuff which is given to all “service staff” on “eids” including the Christians, not only that my usual personal contribution was there and this motivated rest of the staff to pitch in and contribute some money, including cake cuttings. The office in which I myself operate from when we gave the money along cake I clearly saw the chap crying with tears and told us that he was over whelmed as he too had seen the worst the radicals threw at them few years ago. A point to note is that on an average in addition to company’s “Eidi” staff gift to our Christians colleagues (about 10 of them) was around 50K each, the smiles the tears the gratitude were worth a billion rupees.

Best thing was that I did not hear a single complaint from any quarter that why are we doing it for Christians, which led me to believe that we are going back to our roots of tolerance and religious freedom, we are not completely there yet but we are moving towards that. It will not be 100% every human society has its share of radicals but it the general populace that matter and we will Insha’Allah be there. This is the cultural shift which was need of the time, unlike the countries which claim of religious tolerance and yet are at the core extremist, we on the other hand have been labeled by the world as religiously less tolerant and yet we are demonstrating otherwise instead of just words. We are Muslims and we are proud of that, and demonstrating to the world this is how a Muslim society treats its citizens of other religion.

We are not secular and we will never be a secular state, we are Muslims and a Muslim state that's how our religion teaches us to treat people of other religion. Time to take pride in who we are.

@Mangus Ortus Novem , @The Eagle , @Dubious , @Shane

Great account may Allah reward you richly, I hope we see a wave such as this sweeping the country.
As for the rest I won’t comment on general Zia.

 

[StormBreaker]

It all started during my first job which was for a world leading financial institution and the posting was in Singapore, my boss was from British aristocracy. Coffee machine was next to my cubicle, few months into the job and came Ramadan after two days my boss calls me up and ask me I haven’t seen you taking coffee for the last two days is everything OK and I told him it was our holy month and we fast during this month and this is for 29 or 30 days and after that we celebrate, same day the coffee machine was moved to a far off place and all my colleagues stopped eating drinking in near my cubicle. Mind you that I hadn’t completely overcome the prejudices which are programmed in our brains from childhood about people of other religions despite 7 years of education in UK and it was only few years after Zia’s death that I went abroad so his version of Islam was in full flow in Pakistan, This gesture was something which moved me deeply that people of other religions the Christians, the Buddhists, and others are giving so much respect to my religious believes, they didn’t stop there they threw eid parties for us and gave us (my family and I) gifts, it was the same when I was transferred out to North America (USA and later Canada) people honored and respect my religious believes.

When we decided to come back to Pakistan we were astonished to find that despite being a Muslim country, with over 90% population of Muslims and despite the fact that Islam by virtue of it philosophy teaches religious tolerance people looked down on other religions, used nasty words about them.

However, lately in the last couple of years it seems we are coming out of the sick, perverted version of Zia and his minion’s religion, as I say we the people pf Pakistan have always been tolerant of people from other nationalities/ethnicities and religions.

Anyways last year was my first year in my current organization, which does give out “Eidi”, “clothes” and eid Mubarak to all staff in the service area, meaning the office boys, the guards, the riders, the cleaning guys, drivers etc. Come Christmas I came to know no such tradition of giving official leave to Christians or “Eidi” for that matter, so I took initiative last year and gave all Christians staff “eidi” from my own pocket and arranged cake cutting in all offices where we had Christian staff and gave them official leave on 24th and 26th, it did not make us Christians if you know contrary to the jahileen who have been sending ridiculous messages on social media, just the way giving my fasting and eid respect did not make my colleagues Muslims.

Somehow or the other company came to know about it and this year the company decided to treat the Christian “eid” as our “eid” and gave away all the usual stuff which is given to all “service staff” on “eids” including the Christians, not only that my usual personal contribution was there and this motivated rest of the staff to pitch in and contribute some money, including cake cuttings. The office in which I myself operate from when we gave the money along cake I clearly saw the chap crying with tears and told us that he was over whelmed as he too had seen the worst the radicals threw at them few years ago. A point to note is that on an average in addition to company’s “Eidi” staff gift to our Christians colleagues (about 10 of them) was around 50K each, the smiles the tears the gratitude were worth a billion rupees.

Best thing was that I did not hear a single complaint from any quarter that why are we doing it for Christians, which led me to believe that we are going back to our roots of tolerance and religious freedom, we are not completely there yet but we are moving towards that. It will not be 100% every human society has its share of radicals but it the general populace that matter and we will Insha’Allah be there. This is the cultural shift which was need of the time, unlike the countries which claim of religious tolerance and yet are at the core extremist, we on the other hand have been labeled by the world as religiously less tolerant and yet we are demonstrating otherwise instead of just words. We are Muslims and we are proud of that, and demonstrating to the world this is how a Muslim society treats its citizens of other religion.

We are not secular and we will never be a secular state, we are Muslims and a Muslim state that's how our religion teaches us to treat people of other religion. Time to take pride in who we are.

@Mangus Ortus Novem , @The Eagle , @Dubious , @Shane

What you did was great, shows our harmonious nature Pakistani muslims !!!

 

[Meengla]

I have heard from my dad that Pakistan was like current Turkey in the 60’s.You have a good economy, quite tolerant to other non muslim people and good movie or music industry

It was well into the 1970s that Pakistan was a Sufi-oriented tolerant and vibrant society. Then it suited the West and General Zia to counter the Soviets and thus began nasty, widespread social engineering in Pakistan under Zia... People often accuse ZAB of Islamization but, believe me, Bhutto was never a fundamentalist and despite some token measures to appease the right wing, Pakistan remained a liberal society under Bhutto. I am old enough to vividly remember Bhutto era and even under Zia things were not bad until after 1979 onwards--the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was the catalyst for Pakistan's problems.

It was Zia! And no wonder he's still cursed by just about all segments of the Pakistani society. But I am glad that Pakistan is getting out of his influence.

 

[Kaniska]

It was well into the 1970s that Pakistan was a Sufi-oriented tolerant and vibrant society. Then it suited the West and General Zia to counter the Soviets and thus began nasty, widespread social engineering in Pakistan under Zia... People often accuse ZAB of Islamization but, believe me, Bhutto was never a fundamentalist and despite some token measures to appease the right wing, Pakistan remained a liberal society under Bhutto. I am old enough to vividly remember Bhutto era and even under Zia things were not bad until after 1979 onwards--the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was the catalyst for Pakistan's problems.

It was Zia! And no wonder he's still cursed by just about all segments of the Pakistani society. But I am glad that Pakistan is getting out of his influence.

If i understand correctly, even the vision of your founding father was great. His intention and objective to create a space for South Asian Muslims devoid of any rigid orthodoxy in your society was noble objective for your people...But lack of democratic institutions and lack of faith in civilian gov, made your army more powerful. You can not have a successful democratic set up while Army pulls the plug for all critical decisions.

 

[Meengla]

If i understand correctly, even the vision of your founding father was great. His intention and objective to create a space for South Asian Muslims devoid of any rigid orthodoxy in your society was noble objective for your people...But lack of democratic institutions and lack of faith in civilian gov, made your army more powerful. You can not have a successful democratic set up while Army pulls the plug for all critical decisions.

Yes. The movement for Pakistan was a very secular movement. It was to protect the rights of the Muslims of the Subcontinent. Recently saw an interview by either Sashi Tharoor or P. Chidambaran where they put the blame for the Pakistan movement and the Partition on the Hindu Mahasabha in the 1930s; Jinnah reacted to that and Pakistan became a reality. It was a historic blunder by H.M and later by Nehru just before the Partition. But it's for another topic.

I don't think the Pakistani Military has the kind of freehand in Pakistan as people perceive it to have. Pakistan is not Egypt or countries similar to that. The Army in Pakistan is a guarantor which is trusted by most Pakistanis; the role is more powerful than in Israel but, like Israel, Pakistan still has very considerable civilian sources of power. Never forget that Musharraf was the Army Chief and the President of Pakistan but he was humiliated, shouted upon, ridiculed openly, and even reduced to being 'the Bunker President' and had to run away just to save his skin. Of course he could have used his powers to try to quash the opposition--in the mold of General Zia did in 1983/84--but Pakistan is a changed country since 9/11...

 

[Sheikh Rauf]

Enough Malays/ Muslims in Singapore to know what Ramadan is....British never cease to surprise me with their lack of knowledge despite at 1 point in history controlling a many countries?!

I had a British boss who asked if I spoke Arabic since we spoke it in Pakistan (no idea who gave him that thought...and this guy was PhD graduate and a topper!)


This has little to do with religion and more to do with basic ethics which somehow is missing in Pakistan!

My family left after Zia's era and we were seen as Zia's Pakistanis by Muslims we met = we know more about Islam (Not sure how that came about).
Our passport was respected = no long queues for American nor Australian visa (Have both on my green passport during the early 90s)
Our people were seen as trustworthy and employed with closed eyes! No fake degree Shenanigan, no fear of twisting laws, no lack of skills!

What happened?




Awesome gesture!! Much respect!!


He is pointing out a problem and showing a way to solution even if it started in his own office!

If we dont "look at these dark spots" and discuss what to do with them, who will do it for us? Angels from heaven? No, the country is for us and we its people, we need to own that and hence is our responsibility too!

I agree that we need to highlight issues and discuss em so ww can find solution but pointing out one person is not solution why only Zia why not before or after how about those who complaint about one person generally why not highlight gov or non gov officials who are corrupt why not start from their own home neighbours or relatives instead only zia.

 

[Dubious]

why not before or after how about those who complaint about one person generally why not highlight gov or non gov officials who are corrupt why not start from their own home neighbours or relatives instead only zia.

Agreed!

I have mentioned this before ...

Zia may have started some bad path but what about the after era? Why wasnt there a single politician who could undo it? Weaklings or just cashing on the mistake?

 

[ps3linux]

Agreed!

I have mentioned this before ...

Zia may have started some bad path but what about the after era? Why wasnt there a single politician who could undo it? Weaklings or just cashing on the mistake?

Sorry for the late reply spend better part of the week nursing my kidney stones and getting punctured by doctors in one vein or the other.

Anyways my school (from where I did my matric) used to be few hundred meter short of GHQ although its gone now and I did my matric in the last year of Zia's era, one of his favorite hobby was to indulge in routine matter of the school and education, met him multiple times as his other hobby was to invite us poor students to airport for welcoming the foreign dignitaries and waving flags. In person he was a very humble guy. I am from a family which prides itself in producing one general or the other in Army and Airforce and I know how sick the man was how he destroyed the ethical/moral and religious fiber of this country, of course the west did play its role, so did the saudis, their pets the UAE, Egypt, yemen, Iran and many many other but it were our generals who sold their souls to the devil all for what dollars. Moral fiber went so down that when an ex Air Chief was appointed as ambassador to USA his credentials were rejected by USA on account "we don't accept drug smugglers as ambassadors" most of the current breed of politicians were raised in his nursery. He has contributions but his other deeds far outshine his contributions.

Nonetheless we are returning to our root of tolerance and interfaith harmony.