Pak pledges to rebuild Hindu temple demolished by Muslim fanatics

ISLAMABAD: The government of Pakistan’s northwestern

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

(

KP

) province announced on Friday the reconstruction of a Hindu temple that was vandalised and demolished by a mob earlier this week in Karak district, which borders the country’s volatile tribal region.


KP chief minister

Mahmood Khan

claimed that the provincial government has issued directives to the authorities concerned to make all preparations for the reconstruction of the temple.

He said police have arrested several suspects involved in the incident.

Meanwhile, the KP police have named over 350 people in the FIR filed under Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act. The charges framed against the accused included defiling a place of worship, hurting religious sentiments, robbery, arson, and assault.

According to the FIR, a local cleric,

Maulana Mohammad Sharif

, during a protest rally directed the participants, of whom there were more than 1,000, to destroy the shrine. He said the demolition of a Hindu place of worship on Muslim land was a sacred duty,

The FIR noted that about 400 people led by

Maulana Sharif

attacked and set the temple ablaze. It has also been mentioned in the police FIR that an angry mob opened fire at the police and took away objects from the temple.

The cleric who led the mob has political association with

Jamiat Ulema

Islam Fazal (JUI-F), a rightwing party. He has already been arrested by the police.

The samadhi of Shri Paramhans Ji Maharaj in Karak is considered sacred by the Hindu community, and Hindu devotees, especially from Sindh, used to frequently visit it.

This wasn’t the first time that the shrine has been targeted by bigots. In 1997, a group of Muslim fanatics destroyed it. Since its refurbishment in 2015, it has had police and guards stationed outside over security fears.