Senate Body Decides To Study Forced Conversion Cases ‘In Detail’ To Protect Minorities

Senate Body Decides To Study Forced Conversion Cases ‘In Detail’ To Protect Minorities
In order to stop force conversion of citizens belonging to the minority communities, Senate Standing Committee To Protect Minorities from Forced Conversions has decided to study a few cases to identify key areas to stop this practice.

The Senate body under the chairmanship of Senator Anwarul Haq Kakar adopted rules of procedures for the parliamentary committee and discussed possible avenues of moving forward in the administrative approach.

The members decided to take a few cases and study them in detail to identify key areas where gaps were needed to be filled and measures taken to improve the administrative structures so that the citizens belonging to religious minorities are not forced to convert to any other religion.

According to the members of the Senate body, the issue of forced conversion was not a religious, but social. They agreed that steps needed to be taken to strengthen the weak areas to stop this unlawful practice. It also decided to take input and data from the provincial departments and other experts.

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), which released its latest State of Human Rights 2019 report on April 30, underlined that on average over 1,000 cases of forced conversions take place in the country every year. A majority of these are suffered by the Hindu community in Sindh.