In 1898 the Catholic and Protestant missionaries in India lobbied the government for land to set up a Christian Community. They were assigned some land in Lahore, and they set about encouraging converts to move there.
The result was a community of Christian landowners who worked the land and provided work opportunities for the locals.
In 1949 cease-fire line split the Lahore Diocese in two.
Many Christians suddenly found themselves living in the new state of Pakistan, based on an arbitrary line drawn on a map (Shatzmiller 2005).
The government of the newly formed country of Pakistan embarked on nation-building propaganda, indoctrinating citizens to believe that race and language were secondary to religion when it came to the definition of identity, and that differences in religious beliefs implied ‘otherness’ (Chaturvedi 2002).
Things took a distinct turn for the worse after the coup led by Zia al-Haq, an Islamist general, in 1977.
Zia instituted martial law and passed several discriminatory laws, including the infamous ‘blasphemy’ law (number 295 in the Pakistani penal code) which criminalised defiling places of worship with the intent of insulting religion.
If found guilty of blasphemy, a person could be imprisoned for up to two years (Walbridge in Shatzmiller 2005).
In subsequent years legislators passed additions to the law. In 1980 it became a criminal offense to say or do anything that could be construed as insulting important Muslim figures (law 295A).
Then in 1982 the law was extended to criminalise the disrespecting the Holy Qu’ran, stipulating life imprisonment for anyone found guilty of such a crime (law 295B).
This was then further extended (law 295C) to designate an automatic death penalty for those found guilty of ‘defiling’ the name of the Prophet of Islam, whatever the actual intent of the person (295B) (Walbridge in Shatzmiller 2005).
The 295C blasphemy law was very dangerous for Christians. It made it possible for Muslims to point a finger at any Christian they had an issue with, accusing them of having insulted the prophet.
This led to the perpetuation of many injustices, with Christians losing their lives after an envious neighbour or a disgruntled competitor accused them of blasphemy to get rid of them.
The most high-profile example of blasphemy law persecution in Pakistan is the case of Asia Bibi.
Bibi is a Christian woman who was accused of blasphemy after an argument with her Muslim co-workers. She was sentenced to death in 2010 and spent eight years on death row before being acquitted by the Supreme Court in 2018.
Despite her acquittal, Bibi still faces threats from hard-line Islamist groups and has been forced to live in hiding. Her case has brought international attention to the issue of blasphemy laws in Pakistan and helped shine a light on the persecution that Christians and other religious minorities face in the country.
In addition to the very real risk of persecution, Christians and other minorities are also ‘othered’ by the separate electoral systems instituted in the Zia era, which dictated that they could only vote for representatives of their own religions.
This means that Muslim politicians have no interest whatsoever in protecting minority rights, because as far as they are concerned, the Christians are not their constituents, essentially disenfranchising them in the process (Walbridge in Shatzmiller 2005).
In addition to legal and institutional discrimination, Christians in Pakistan are commonly derided and devalued by their fellow (Muslim) Pakistanis, who refer to them as ‘chuhras,’ a derogatory term originally associated with the untouchables caste, setting them apart from the rest of society.
Thus ‘‘some borders are no longer situated at the borders at all’ in geographical or political senses of the terms. Borders have become invisible borders, situated everywhere and nowhere. Hence the undesirable persons are not expelled by the border, they are forced to be border.’ (Balibar as cited in Khosravi 2007: 333).
Claudine Cassar began her professional journey in business, earning a BSc in Business and Computing from the University of Malta, followed by an MSc in International Marketing from the University of Strathclyde and an MPhil in Innovation from Maastricht Business School. At the age of 23, she founded her first company, which she successfully sold to Deloitte 17 years later.
At 45, Claudine made a bold career shift, returning to university to pursue a degree in Anthropology. Three years later, she graduated with a BA (Hons) in Anthropological Sciences. In 2022, she published her debut book, “The Battle for Sicily’s Soul.“