Pakistan Hindu Council (PHC) patron-in-chief Dr Ramesh Kumar Vankwani Wednesday invited all the citizens to participate in the holi festival to be celebrated on Thursday.
Dr Ramesh, while demanding public holiday on the festival outside Parliament House in Islamabad, emphasized the need to promote interfaith harmony across the country, adding that ancient Hindu festival was no longer limited to Hindu community rather it is celebrated widely, in many parts of South Asia as well as other parts of the world. He said the celebration of Holi was reminder of the symbolic great victory of good over evil.
“The purpose behind the initiative by the PHC to invite other Pakistanis for the joint celebration of Holi festival is to promote the common basis of ‘love of god and love of the neighbour, love of the good and love of the neighbour’ among all religions,” he said.
Replying to a query about the civil awards that is given on the Pakistan Day (March 23), he regretted that many patriot Hindu citizens with outstanding positive contributions to Pakistan were in dire need of the government’s attention and in this regard he named some of them: first law and labour minister Jogandra Nath Mandal, first speaker of Punjab Assembly SP Singha, renowned humanitarian Sir Ganga Ram, father of Modern Karachi Hari Chand Rai, Justice Rana Bhagwan Das and comrade Sobho Gian Chandani.
Dr Vankwani also urged to raise voice for not including even a single chapter to acknowledge the positive contributions of non-Muslim Pakistanis in educational text books.