UK parliamentary group for British Hindus to take persecution of Pakistan's Hindus to the British government

A UK parliamentary group says it will raise the persecution of Hindus in Pakistan with the British government and in Parliament, The Times of India reported from London. The move follows a report titled "Religious Persecution of Hindus in Pakistan", presented by the British Hindu advocacy group INSIGHT UK to the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for British Hindus.

According to the APPG secretariat, one suggestion was a letter to the Foreign Office seeking a meeting so the department can raise the reported atrocities against minorities with the current establishment in Pakistan. The spokesperson said there was also a discussion on asking for aid to Pakistan to be curtailed.

The UK is one of the largest providers of overseas aid to Pakistan, and the report calls for that aid to be made "conditional on progress", with some funding ring-fenced for Pakistani organisations that defend minority rights. It also asks the British government to commission an official report every six months on the socio-economic condition of Pakistan's minorities and to provide asylum pathways for religious minorities who have suffered abuse.

The report says Pakistan's Hindu share of the population has fallen from 14.6% before 1947 to 1.7% today. It describes how Hindus who fled during the 1965 India-Pakistan war were stripped of ancestral property and farmland through enemy property laws, pushing families into poverty.

It points to constitutional provisions requiring both the president and the prime minister to be Muslim as entrenching second-class status for minorities. The report also covers attacks on temples and forced marriages and conversions of Hindu and Christian girls, and notes that "international media coverage has been notably scarce".