“There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children”, said Nelson Mandela. In Pakistan, the poisonous religious hate for Kafirs (non-Muslims who are ordained to be killed or converted to Islam) manifested itself with a young boy, all of 8 years old, being maliciously framed for blasphemy, a charge that attracts the death penalty in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The theocratic, autocratic, acronym of a “state” got the unique distinction of charging the youngest person for blasphemy – the wilful desecration of faith.

He was charged for the crime after he was accused to have urinated on the carpet of a Madarsa. The boy has been taken into ‘protective custody’ following the incident and he had spent a week in jail before receiving bail. His family have gone into hiding following retribution. 

Following the boy being charged, a Bhagwan Ganesha temple was also desecrated in “retaliation” to the supposed urination in the Madrasa by the little boy. Videos emerged where one could see irate Muslims with stones, sticks and swords desecrating the temple – all because of trumped-up charges.

The malice, and how the boy was framed

Reports indicate that the boy had urinated in the Madrasa inadvertently. The 8-year-old boy entered the Madrasa which was attached to a mosque by mistake and was subsequently ‘caught’ by Maulvi Hafiz Mohammad Ibrahim. When caught, the scared boy urinated on the spot. Post the incident, the child’s father apologised profusely to the Maulvi and the Muslim community. He said his child was mentally challenged and did not know what he was doing. However, the irate Muslims could not really accept that a child, even if it is a Kafir child, can simply make a “mistake”.

An FIR was filed against the child and later, he was arrested. In retribution, a temple was desecrated by a Muslim mob and 22 parties comprising of religious organisations and political parties refused to condemn the incident. The head of the alliance even went on to say that the majority community, Muslims in this case, had the right to slaughter a cow right in front of a temple. Hindu community in the conservative district of Rahim Yar Khan, in Punjab, have fled their homes as well, after the Muslim mob ram amuck.

It is not hard to understand that a young Hindu boy, when being hounded by a Maulvi in the Islamic State of Pakistan, would be nervous enough to urinate in his pants considering they know the fate Hindus meet in Pakistan. Would his parents not have told him about keeping his head down and not entering mosques knowing what Muslims do to Kafirs? Would his parents have not explained to him what the ramifications of being a Hindu in Islamic Pakistan are? Knowing all of that, would the child not know the fate that awaits after he was caught by a Maulvi for his mistake? So it is unimaginable that the boy would urinate himself?

None of this was considered. In fact, the Maulvi and the irate Muslims said that the 8-year-old boy deliberately desecrated the Madrasa which was attached to a mosque. They considered it a deliberate act, that he urinated – out of fear.

One has to then wonder if the act of accidental urination was simply used as reuse to incarcerate the little boy. The Maulvi has to know that the act of urination was accidental. Even after the father of the boy said that the boy was mentally challenged, he was booked for blasphemy – an act that invites the death penalty. In reality, it is evident that the Muslim community of Pakistan wanted the boy arrested and murdered for “blasphemy” simply for entering the Madrasa. Simply for existing and being a Hindu in a state where non-Muslims are looked upon as Kafirs who should be killed or converted.

Recently, a Pakistani Muslim man was seen threatening and forcing a Hindu boy to chant ‘Allahu Akbar’. The victim was also coerced into abusing Hindu Gods and Goddesses.

The video was uploaded on social media by a popular Facebook user named Prakash Heerani. The accused, Abdul Salam Abu Dawood, was seen grabbing the victim by the collar and ordering him to chant Allahu Akbar. When the boy complied, the accused asked him to utter expletives directed at Hindu Gods. “Abuse your deities in the name of mother and sister…Say your God is a sister f*cker. You guys have polluted entire Pakistan,” Dawood was heard as saying.

Abdul Salam Abu Dawood, a native of Rahim Yar Khan in Pakistan, had uploaded the video on his Youtube channel with the caption, “Hindu torture by Muslim in Pakistan.” Following public outrage, he was quick to delete the video. 

Dawood was also seen threatening Hindus with genocide and complete annihilation. In a video posted in April this year, he warned, “If we start killing Hindus in Pakistan it would only take 30 minutes…We will kill Hindu men and take Hindu women. We will procreate from these women and make them ‘mujahid’ (fighters/Islamic terrorists ). Don’t mess with us we have a lot of people (Muslims) in India that would not take time to kill you (Hindus).”

Two incidents brutalising and torturing children emerged in the last few days from the same area – Rahim Yar Khan – one of a child being forced to abuse his own faith and another, charged with blasphemy, falsely, simply because he existed as a Hindu in an Islamic state. To say that any of this happened because the Islamic faith was deliberately desecrated should ideally, be considered the denial of basic human rights in the face of state persecution. But it won’t, because the Islamic faith is ‘desecrated’ by the mere existence of Hindus and that in itself is a trope that has been normalised to such an extent, that it has become acceptable.