Nationalist Saraiki Parties have urged upon the Government to release Zubair Ahmed of Harbanspura ,Lahore because he is a hero who vandalised the statue of Raja Ranjit Singh.Pakistan Saraiki Party Chief Malik Allah Nawaz Vance said that Ranjit sindh invaded Multan and martyred all Muslims including Nawab Muzaffar Khan and his family. He was invader and People of Multan hate him because he was a killer of Muslims and Saraiki culture. They said that Zubair Ahmed had expressed his hate against an invader.They threatened to launch an agitation across the Punjab province if he was not released forthwith.
A year after it was first vandalised, the statue of Punjab’s former ruler Raja Ranjit Singh — located near his grave at Lahore's Royal Fort — has again been damaged.
A young man allegedly broke the arm of the Maharaja's statue, following which the police arrested him and registered a case.
According to police, the suspect hails from Lahore's Harbanspura.
Talking about the incident, the fort's security guard claimed that the man had suddenly jumped over the barrier to reach Singh's statue.
The attacker, reportedly exclaiming "why has the statue been installed in the fort", proceeded to damage the sculpture.
After the suspect broke the arm of the statue, the security guards caught him and handed him over to the police.
Last year in August, two men had allegedly vandalised the statue.
Both men went straight to the statue and started hitting it with wooden rods, resulting in the breakage of one of its arms, besides damage to other parts of the statue.
Security guards had rushed to the spot and captured the attackers who were chanting slogans against the former ruler of Punjab.
Later, the attackers were handed over to the police, who registered a case against them on the complaint of Walled City Authority.
Superintendent of Police (SP) Syed Ghazanfar Shah had said that the attackers were motivated and vandalised the statue "on the basis of religious bias".ike those before him, the suspect, Zeeshan, also told the police that the Ranjit Singh’s statue should not have been built as he had committed atrocities against Muslims during his rule.
Speaking to Dawn, Bansal said that there would always be people who would remain unaware of Punjab’s rich Sikh history — this had been the case since 1947. “There has been so much apathy and mistrust over the Partition that it has caused misinformation and misunderstanding between Muslims and Sikhs as well as other religions,” he said. “It is sad that people target a monument without knowing the facts.”
Bansal said that unfortunately Sikh History had never been taught in Pakistan’s schools.
Most students know about Mughal and British rule, but absolutely nothing about how Sikh’s ruled for so long in a secular manner, he said. The Sikh chapter is a link to Punjab’s identity both culturally and politically.
Bansal went on to specify how the rule had been and said that the Sikh period had been the most peaceful period. “Ranjit Singh had employed more Muslims and Hindus in his court than people of any other religion — there were hardly any Sikhs nobles in the darbar — Sikhs were usually sent to guard the frontiers,” he said. “Ranjit Singh had repaired and restored many mosques and the Sunehri Masjid was given gold and a facelift after he evicted occupying troops from it. He never forcibly converted anyone to any faith and even married a Muslim woman, Gul Begum.”
The act of vandalism has been condemned by some on Twitter. A user wrote: “So a statue of Maharaja Ranjit Singh has again been vandalized for the second time in Lahore fort. What’s different between those Pakistanis who support this act, and #Modibhakts who call Aurangzeb Alamgir and Tipu Sultan terrorists?”
Although the teenager who has now been arrested had been influenced by the now deceased Khadim Hussain Rizvi, who had preached hate against the Sikh ruler, the colour of intolerance towards personalities of other religions have been tainting society since a long time and many academics and civil society activists have been uneasy about it.
Minority rights activist and chairperson of the People’s Commission for Minority Rights (PCMR), Peter Jacob, said that it was time to keep in check the kind of intolerance that has seeped into society, and which has also received impunity in the public discourse. “The sociology of this should be investigated — why are people behaving like this?” he said.
