Mob vandalises Ahmadi place of worship in Karachi

A violent mob vandalised an Ahmadi place of worship for the second time in a span of nine months in Pakistans Karachi city on Thursday, police and spokesperson for the community said.The attack took place at Jamshed Quarters when around 20-25 people broke into the building and damaged minarets and windows before fleeing the scene, Jamshed Quarters Superintendent of Police SP Farhat Kamal said.Amir Mehmood, a spokesman for the Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya Pakistan, said the same worship place was attacked in January also.

A violent mob vandalised an Ahmadi place of worship for the second time in a span of nine months in Pakistan's Karachi city on Thursday, police and spokesperson for the community said.

The attack took place at Jamshed Quarters when around 20-25 people broke into the building and damaged minarets and windows before fleeing the scene, Jamshed Quarters Superintendent of Police (SP) Farhat Kamal said.

Amir Mehmood, a spokesman for the Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya Pakistan, said the same worship place was attacked in January also. A first information report was registered but no arrests were made.

According to a report released by Jamaat-e-Ahmadiyya Pakistan earlier this month, since January 2023, at least 28 incidents of desecration of Ahmadi's places of worship have taken place across Pakistan with 10 of these occurring in Sindh and remaining in Punjab province.

Providing details of Thursday's attack, Mehmood said the incident took place around noon when more than a dozen "extremists" entered the premises of the worship place using a ladder and damaged windows, glass doors, wooden door, cameras, LED, tables and chairs.

According to SP Kamal, the police rushed to the spot and obtained information from the watchman about the incident.

The police are trying to obtain CCTV footage to ascertain the identity of the suspects, but there was no power in the locality at the time of the incident, he said.

Ahmadis are usually referred to as Qadianis in Pakistan, which is considered a derogatory term for them. This year on Eid Ul-Azha, the community was even restrained from sacrificing animals.

Pakistan's Parliament in 1974 declared the Ahmadi community as non-Muslims. A decade later, they were banned from calling themselves Muslims. They are banned from preaching and from travelling to Saudi Arabia for pilgrimage.

Although the number of Ahmadis in Pakistan is around a million, unofficial figures put their population much higher.

In Pakistan, around 10 million out of the 220 million population are non-Muslims. The minorities in conservative Muslim-majority Pakistan often complain of harassment by the extremists.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)