In a time when everything in the world is changing for the better, there is one country, Pakistan to be precise, which believes in going back in time. When it comes to our favourite topic of debate, religion or Islam to be specific, everybody has to board the moral brigade of what is moral and what is amoral.
Pakistanis have an innate thing about being emotional about each and every thing that exists on this planet, but how do we forget to use a handsomely working brain that we all have been endowed with? How religion or the faith of a person revolves around how pious or hidden he has kept his women? Or is there more to the beautiful religion that was preached to us by our beloved Prophet Muhammad PBUH?
Of course, the answer is yes. There is a whole lot more to the religion than what is being preached in the country by the mullahs, be it the crude comments given by a popular political mullah of a so-called Islamic group regarding the involvement of women in PTI jalsas, or the regressive approach of the Council of Islamic Ideology of supporting underage marriages, or the very debatable thoughts by the same on a man not requiring permission from his wife when it comes to his decision of second marriage, or suggesting that DNA tests as forms of evidence aren’t permissible as the primary evidence in rape cases.
These are only a handful of recent examples of how the rights and role of Muslim women is being laid out by a bunch of people who show a misogynist mindset. If religion is what they are dealing with, why are issues of sectarian violence, particularly Shia genocide, not being talked about? What about bringing together the various sects in Islam closer to one another?
What about the cases of religious extremism that pop up left, right and centre and our hard liner reactions to them? Islam is also about loving thy neighbour as well as respecting people of other religions. Where do our Islamic values go when it comes to all these matters of great importance?
We as Pakistanis have a herd mentality, and not using logic is yet another thing that we excel at. We love highlighting the negative even out of an achievement or something that is to be proud of, but when it comes to ills that have seeped into our society, we dare not speak, more so in the matters of religion.
But it is high time now that we produce ulema who know what they are talking about, so as not to make a parody of the most beautiful religion we have, and give women and men alike, irrespective of religion their deserved due.
SALIMA MEHDI
Lahore