The graves of those belonging to the Ahmadi community were desecrated in Faisalabad, while the burial of a woman was denied in Sialkot, as members of the group continue to face a discriminatory approach.
On Jan 22, miscreants desecrated the graves in chak 89 of a Faisalabad district, after cutting the barbed wires to enter the graveyard.
They then reportedly attempted to light the caskets and some other things surrounding the graves. In a similar incident in the same graveyard Nov 20, 2022, unidentified men had damaged the tombstones of three graves. Police were informed about it but an FIR of the incident wasn’t registered, as per reports.
In Sialkot, on Jan 21, 2023, the burial of a 75-year-old woman was denied in the local graveyard. Police, in this incident, too, forced the community to bury the lady somewhere else. Subsequently, the body had to be taken 250 kilometres away, to Rabwah, for burial.
There have been reports of desecration of the graves earlier as well from different parts of the country. In some instances, it was done in the presence of the police, with the culprits being free from punishment.
Last week, unidentified miscreants damaged the minarets of an Ahmadi place of worship in Karachi, on Thursday, as those responsible for earlier such incidents reportedly remain at large.
They entered the place of worship located at Martin Road via a ladder from the front and damaged the minarets with a hammer.
When police reached the scene of the incident, the miscreants left the hammer at the roof of the place of worship and fled from the scene.
Earlier this month, police razed minarets of a place of worship belonging to the community, in Wazirabad, according to a spokesperson.
The razing, the second such incident in Punjab in less than a month, took place in the Moti Bazaar area.
Furthermore, in Dec last year, the community claimed that police razed minarets atop their place of worship in Baghanpura, Gujranwala.
The minarets, they said, predated the promulgation of Ahmadiyya-specific Ordinance XX.
Authorities are yet to take a concrete action against the culprits to stop the incidents, once and for all, with tangible evidence available.
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