Joseph Colony : Rising from the ashes

Double layers of coiled barbed wire protect the entrances to the camps set up for the residents of Joseph Colony whose houses were burned down in a mob attack last week. Riot police are deployed at the entrance and exit points, and traffic wardens guide vehicles carrying reporters, city government officials and relief goods. Two streets leading to the decades-old gated Christian neighborhood in Lahore's Badami Bagh area are packed with white tents, most of which were donated by the Al-Khair foundation, a UK based religious charity. Residents of Joseph Colony lost their homes after they were asked to evacuate because the police could not protect them from an angry mob of Muslim men who went on to attack the neighborhood. "We trusted the police and thought our belongings would be safe because they had asked us to leave," says Rubina Saleem, mother of three and wife of a Rickshaw driver. "The police said we had to hurry because the mob might hurt our women, so we did not take anything with us." There were similar stories of loss in every tent and on every crowded charpoy. "All our lives we have served those who are above us," said Mrs Perveen Pervaiz. "We have cleaned people's houses, even their filth, and this is how our community gets paid? I am very angry. I pray that those who dragged our women into the streets and made us homeless should face the same circumstances." Thousands of Muslim men had gathered outside the Joseph Colony on March 8 to avenge alleged blasphemy committed by Sawan Masih, who lived in the locality, in a conversation with Shahid Imran, a local barber. Despite Sawan's arrest under Section 295-C of the penal code, which the Christian elders had agreed to, the mob attacked the colony, and robbed and torched more than 150 houses and two churches. Local residents say they were both drunk when the conversation took place. But Sawan's brother Babar Masih disagrees. He believes the problem may be political. Sawan Masih and Shahid Imran were supporting rival groups in the elections for the local trade unions. Eating rice and chicken from a polythene bag, Babar said he believed Shahid's group paid him to make the allegation. "Shahid Imran is a good lad," said Sawan's father Chaman Masih. "He was the caterer at the weddings of all of my children. Someone has misled him." Sawan's defense council Naeem Shakir is a human rights activist and belongs to the Awami Workers Party. "The FIR says the alleged blasphemy took place at dawn on March 7," he said. "The report was registered at 3:45pm on March 8. That leaves sufficient time to manipulate the events and concoct lies." Sawan's house is on the outer front of Joseph Colony, on a street where there are several Iron Factory warehouses. His family is among several others who say they had been pressured by businessmen in the area frequently in the last two years to sell their land to them for cheap. Home to more than 260 families, Joseph Colony is not a new settlement. A majority of its residents were born and brought up in the locality. The occupants are mostly janitorial staff at government offices. Some work in the iron factories in the area. Shakir says the mob attack, in the presence of police, is more than about just land grabbing or intolerance. It shows the state's complicity in crimes against minorities. "We have said it 100 times that Sawan did not commit blasphemy," said Bushra, the man's sister. "And those who are paragons of virtue, can they not see the blasphemy they committed while setting fire to our churches and Bibles?" she said her mother had suffered a heart attack after his arrest and had been sent to live with her relatives in Faisalabad. Bushra was among the several families who had not been given a tent by then. The district government had set up 185 tents, and was struggling to persuade people to follow a procedure for acquiring relief goods and tents. Various charities were stopped from distributing food and relief items. Unused beddings, tents and charpoys were set up in two schools of the area, but most of the victims preferred to stay on the street adjacent to Joseph Colony. Some of them walked back to the few homes where the toilets were still working, because there are no toilets with the tents. The trauma of losing their homes was visible on the faces of Joseph Town residents. Mrs Majah is a widowed mother of two daughters, who lost the dowry she had made for them. She appeared calm, but quietly said: "I wish I could burn the faces of the people who burned our houses." "Wouldn't it be better if the Christian community gets its own province?" Tasneem Wajid said with a shy smile. "We must get our own space, maybe a city of our own," added Rubina, who was living in a nearby camp. The Joseph Colony arson is the largest attack against the Christian community in a major city in Pakistan in terms of damage done. But it is not the first attack of its kind. Since the heinous Shanti Nagar attack in 1997 in which a mob burned down schools, churches and buses, there have been 80 such incidents as per the data compiled by the National Commission for Justice and Peace, a Catholic Church run human rights organization working on religious minorities. Leading Human Rights activist Asma Jahangir believes state institutions have accepted defeat. "They are simply afraid of the people who use religion for mob violence." Veteran journalist, activist and academic Dr Mehdi Hassan blames politicians and their lack of will in resolving the problems with the blasphemy laws. "Until the leading political parties develop a general consensus on the issue of blasphemy laws, we will not get anywhere." He said police needed sophisticated training for dealing with a mob which is charged because of what they think is a religious matter. At the other end of the city, Pervez Masih, a driver in the Lahore Chamber of Commerce, lives in fear in Bihar Colony, another Christian neighborhood. When the other Christians of Bihar Colony were protesting against the Joseph Colony arson, Pervez stayed home. "In my family, we do not engage in any conversation about religion with anyone," he said. "My adult sons are so disturbed by the arson that they did not step out of our house unnecessarily since then." But this Sunday, Pervez Masih said special prayers for peace and religious harmony in Pakistan.