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Tuesday March 19, 2024

A dangerous mindset

March 22, 2019

The Bahawalpur incident where an English professor was killed highlights the fact that living in Pakistan is an everyday struggle for those who want to engage the youth in extracurricular activities. The professor was stabbed to death by his student for organising a welcome party in the college.

Saner voices in Pakistan have expressed anger over the incident, but it seems that some people have dumped down all the rational critique and are turning the clock back to the Stone Age. Islam says that killing a human in Islam is the death of the entire humanity. How can a murder not be un-Islamic – the very reason for which the professor was killed? Those teachings of Islam which condemns violence are not taught to people who end up following in the footsteps of the likes of the student of the deceased professor.

Nasir Soomro

Karachi

*****

This is not the first time that a life was taken using religion as an excuse. Pakistan has witnessed numerous cases where the blasphemy clause is used to justify a murder. We have a large number of people who have this mentality that we can murder someone on the basis of mere accusations. Islam does not allow the public to render justice themselves as this would lead to unrest in the country. But, unfortunately, our people are so emotional and think that rendering justice is their job.

In my opinion, even handing down death penalty to such culprits cannot be the solution. We need to work on changing the flawed mentality. In this regard, Islamic scholars can play a vital role. They must come forward with a clear message to the public that killing a person, on any charges, is not the duty of an individual but the state’s. The duty of an individual is just to report it to the police. But the responsible Islamic scholars have not sent a straightforward answer to the public.

Syed Badshah

Buner

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I shuddered when I came to know that a student in Bahawalpur killed his teacher for organising a mixed-gender reception. The student claimed that the practice was against the teachings of Islam. If a function is un-Islamic, is it Islamic to kill a person?

Was killing the only solution to the problem? I don’t know where we are going and how we lost respect for elders and teachers. In this so-called modern era, we have no ethics. We are lost in gadgets and are far away from books and this is why such practices occur regularly.

Engr Mashal

Peshawar