Yesterday, Punjab Provincial Minister for Human Rights and Minority Affairs Ramesh Singh Arora, a day before the completion of one year of the Jaranwala tragedy, tried to send a message to the world through a press conference that minorities are safe in Pakistan and have equal rights. Those who say minorities are unsafe abroad are making up fabricated stories that have no connection with reality. In my opinion, Ramesh Singh has played the role of a Maratis in the courts of ancient kings through this press conference to please his masters. In reality, the Maratis's job was only to please the king. It should have been that on this occasion, the Minister would have explained what steps the Punjab government has taken this year to provide justice to the victims of the Jaranawala tragedy and what positive results they have yielded. Moreover, this is our policy to prevent such incidents in the future. He had nothing to say about the government's performance in this regard and to give any future action plan. Because the Punjab government has completely failed in this regard, the accused have been released even before the completion of a year due to the poor investigation by the Punjab Police.  This is a dark chapter in Pakistan's history that hundreds of houses and 26 churches were burned in one day, but no one was convicted.

I would like to remind Ramesh Singh that under your influence, 2.6 million Christians in Punjab are unsafe. The minority you claim to be safe is actually a few thousand persecuted Sikhs who have been given seats in the Punjab Assembly by giving them priority over the largest minority in Punjab, the Christians. Not only this, but you have been made their minister and made like  a police officer over them. If you look at it through the lens of power, then minorities will certainly appear to you as victims of insecurity and inequality. Let me make it clear to you that minorities are as safe here as Sikhs are safe in India. This means that they also talk about atrocities against Sikhs in order to humiliate the Indian government and seek political asylum in Canada.  From 1997 to 2023, there have been 91 incidents in which not only Christian settlements and churches but also people have been burned alive, which negates your claim that minorities are safe here.  According to you, Pakistanis living abroad themselves tarnish the image of Pakistan through harsh stories. Are Shanti Nagar, Joseph Colony, Gojra and the Sargodha tragedy self-made stories? Let me remind you that the US State Department's 2023 and 2024 reports also expressed concerns about the protection of minorities in Pakistan. Not only this, but Amnesty International's position is also no different.

Further, if you need proof, the European Union's Committee on Human Rights restricted trade agreements with Pakistan on this basis and included Pakistan in the grey list, making trade sanctions conditional on improving minority rights. Do you think that your press conference will change the stance of the international community? It could just be your wish, nothing more. This press conference of yours has proven that you are not a representative of minorities but a representative of the Sikh community and a political party and are undoubtedly an illegal occupant of the minority representative seat.

This media statement is not the voice of your heart but a political compulsion. But slaughtering another's cow for a piece of your own meat is also not humane.

I will appeal to the organizers of all the events being held across the country today in memory of the Jaranwala tragedy organized by Christian organizations to make you a target of criticism in these events and demand that the Punjab government remove you from this position, otherwise an organized movement will be launched for your resignation.