Muzaffargarh police have recently arrested a 40-year-old Arabic teacher of a government school in Gurmani for allegedly committing blasphemy. The case has been registered on the complaint of a parent of a grade-six student. The school teacher Gibreel Ahmed is said to have beaten a grade-six student, Muhammad Nasir, for coming to the school late.

According to the police report, Muhammad Nasir and Muhammad Safdar, two brothers studying in the same school, told their father Muhammad Bilal on May 10 that the Arabic teacher had beaten them for allegedly "not committing blasphemy". The father then lodged the complaint under section 295-C of Pakistan Penal Code four days after the incident.

"The case was lodged on May 14 and the teacher was arrested the same day and was later sent to jail," says a police official investigating the case.

In early May, a Christian youth Imran Masih was accused of committing blasphemy in Chak 44, village Bosaan of Mandi Bahauddin District. Some extremist groups threatened to burn the houses of Christians in that village, without even ascertaining if the allegation was true or false. The accusation against Imran was that he had watched a blasphemous video clip on his cellular phone. Mercifully, the police took control of the situation by meeting the clerics in the village and saved the houses of Christians from burning.

In the last week of May, another blasphemy case was lodged against a Christian youth Usman Masih for allegedly sharing a blasphemous video clip on the social media.

There is no let up in the filing of blasphemy cases and, despite the fact that the police have been able to mitigate the damage in some cases, there is no real movement in preventing the misuse of blasphemy laws to settle personal and political scores.

Blasphemy laws of Pakistan were revised with stricter sentences in the 1980s during the time of military dictator Ziaul Haq. Statistics clearly indicate that the number of blasphemy cases increased many times over after the sentences were revised, affirming that the stricter punishments instead of being a deterrent had led to many more instances of blasphemy, thereby indicating misuse.

There have been periodic voices raised in the parliament against the misuse of laws: it is almost impossible to suggest a repeal of these laws but some serious efforts have been made to suggest improvements in the law to prevent its misuse. However, the threatening tone of religious forces have not only opposed such voices but actually silenced them.

In 2011, the sitting governor of Punjab Salmaan Taseer was murdered by his official security guard for raising voice against the misuse of blasphemy laws. Later, Shahbaz Bhatti, a Christian federal minister and a critic of blasphemy laws, was assassinated on similar grounds.

In October 2015, the Supreme Court gave a verdict in Salmaan Taseer murder case, urging the government to take serious steps to stop misuse of the blasphemy laws. A 39-page judgment said that blasphemy was "abhorrent and immoral, besides being a manifestation of intolerance, but a false allegation is equally detestable as well as culpable". The court further said "a call for improvements in the blasphemy law in order to provide safeguards against its misuse by levelling false allegations should not be considered objectionable". The court said Islam is also tough against those who level false allegations.

Following the order, the Senate of Pakistan’s Committee of the Whole House unanimously decided to initiate a broad conversation with religious scholars and stakeholders on how to prevent the misuse of the blasphemy laws.

Senator Farhatullah Babar of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) moved a proposal for measures to prevent such misuse in last December. "We had demanded that in the light of the Supreme Court verdict of October 7, 2015, there should be measures to stop this misuse which is distorting the image of Islam and Pakistan. So far there is no significant progress to engage the religious clergy in discussing the matter," he says.

Earlier, towards the end of 2010, PPP’s MNA Sherry Rehman, had submitted a bill in the National Assembly to amend the existing blasphemy laws. In her bill, Rehman had sought an end to the death penalty under the blasphemy laws, maintaining that the definition of blasphemy was vague and "there were serious problems with the mechanisms to implement the law". Her view was that the laws had become a major source of exploitation and victimisation in the name of religion and hurt the minorities and vulnerable sections of society. The murder of Salmaan Taseer led to a wave of fear in society and Rehman too was forced into silence.

Tahir Ashrafi moved a resolution in the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) in 2013, while he was still a member, for strict punishment to those misusing blasphemy laws which has remain unattended.

Babar says he and colleagues are trying to take this issue to the Senate’s Human Rights Committee. "There is gradually a realisation growing among parliamentarians and other civil society groups against the continuous misuse of blasphemy laws. The narrative now is to take serious measures to stop the misuse of these laws that is very sensitive and claims lives through mob provocation and false allegations."

However, Babar has less hopes from the ruling Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) on this important issue because of its "sensitivity".

The issue is sensitive indeed and one wouldn’t expect the PML-N to address it except in a roundabout way. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had in December last year formed a law reforms committee which certainly has a broader mandate. Ashtar Ausaf Ali, a member of the law reforms committee and currently the Attorney General of Pakistan, says the committee is taking up the issue of misuse of laws in general and would suggest improvements by the end of July. "However, nothing is discussed about the misuse of blasphemy laws, in particular. The government will cover the issue of misuse of all laws in general."

Hina Jilani, lawyer and human rights activist, acknowledges that the blasphemy laws are frequently misused in our society. "But there are hardly a few cases where the motives are clear and, even in those cases, the accused person is mostly mentally unstable."

She says the police seem confused while dealing with these cases "because the state had made these laws and encouraged their use in the past. Now when the people have started misusing them, the state is on the defensive. The Police are afraid of elements who back these complaints".

"The problem is that people continue to incite the public on these issues and the state is not showing a resolve to stop its misuse," she concludes.