Recently, during the ongoing session of the Punjab Provincial Assembly, six Christian MPAs presented a unanimous resolution in which they demanded that the undemocratic procedure for nomination to specific minority seats in parliament be abolished and minorities be given the right to elect their representatives through their own votes.

The Christian members of the assembly who signed this unanimous resolution include Philbius Christopher Tariq Gill Shakeela Javed Arthur Wasim Anjum Sandhu Emanuel  Athar Julius and Ijaz Alam Augustine, former Minister for Human Rights and Minority Affairs.  This much-needed resolution regarding the rights of minorities was not signed by the Provincial Minister for Human Rights and Minority Affairs Ramesh Singh Arora and a Hindu member of the Punjab Assembly because they are well aware of the fact that they are illegally occupying the Christian seats of Punjab.  If elections are held democratically, the community of Provincial Minister for Minority Affairs Ramesh Singh Rora does not have more than 5,000 votes in the entire Punjab, while the position of the Hindu member of the assembly is no different from this, while the Christian population in Punjab is more than 2.6 million.  Without a doubt, the selection system is a violation of the political rights of Pakistani Christians.  jaye

I believe that the Christian members of the Punjab Assembly, most of whom have been benefiting from this system for the past thirteen years, have demonstrated nationalism by denying their personal benefits and demanding that minorities be given the right to elect their representatives through their own votes.  He further said that if the government wants to keep minorities included in the national political mainstream, they should be given the right to double vote so that they can maintain their identity while remaining in the national mainstream. Before this resolution, Christian members of the National Assembly and Senator Khalil Tahir Sindhu had also supported this demand on their forum.For the past several years, Christian nationalist organizations in Pakistan have been protesting against the selection system. They have held numerous protests, hunger strikes, and press conferences in small and big cities of the country. However, despite this, the ruling party, including its allies, do not seem willing to change the system that gives voice to minorities, which is a clear expression of their disinterest in the democratic rights of minorities.  The minority people, including the members of the assembly, want to be free from this political slavery, but the ruling political parties want to keep them as political slaves.  Through this article, I would like to remind the ruling majority political parties that before the establishment of Pakistan, when Muslims themselves were in the minority, they recognized that they needed a separate electoral system to maintain their distinct identity.Therefore, to achieve this right, Muhammad Ali Jinnah achieved this democratic right for Muslims through a formal movement in 1929, but today the same Muslims are feeling embarrassed about giving this right to their minorities.

 

I pay tribute to the Christian members of the Punjab Assembly who have unanimously moved a resolution that they should be given the opportunity to be elected to the House through elections, not selection.  Surely they have realized that parties that have two seats each have their own power in parliament, while we are not insignificant despite having six seats. I would like to make a fraternal request to them that if the government does not take their resolution seriously and does not give importance to this demand of Christian senators and MNAs, then Christian MPAs from other provinces should also support their resolution and all Christian parliamentarians should jointly announce their resignations from their seats in a joint press conference.   So that the voice can be raised at the international level that Pakistan is a democratic country where there is a double standard of democratic rights for minorities and the majority  .This is a dramatic democracy in which the right to elect parliamentary representatives for minorities is vested in the majority political parties, who nominate their political slaves in the name of minorities and bring them to the assemblies. Instead of being nominated and representing minorities, they work for the interests of their political patrons. History is witness that in the last 23 years, the minority representatives who have come to the assemblies through the selection system have not made any legislation for the interests of the minorities. In the presence of these representatives, the forced marriage and religious conversion bills were rejected. Equal rights were rejected. The debate is that until the representatives of the minorities are elected by the votes of the minorities and come to the assembly, they will not be able to get the fruits of true democracy.