Aljazeera: This is the second story in a two-part series about blasphemy in Pakistan. The first part, about the case of the first woman on death row for blasphemy in that country, is available here.
KOT RADHA KISHAN, Pakistan — Walking through the quiet, empty streets of Chak 59, patrolled by stray dogs and the odd buffalo, one finds it difficult to tell whether the village is inhabited at all.
It is striking how silence can envelope a life, so as to all but erase it. Or, in this case, two lives: Shama and Shahzad Masih, a young Christian couple accused of blasphemy in this hamlet 31 miles from the big city of Lahore, but deep in the wilderness that dominates Pakistan’s Punjabi heartland.
On Nov. 4, 2014, Shama and Shahzad (most Christians in Pakistan are known only by their first name) were killed by a mob, stirred up by false allegations that the couple had desecrated the Holy Quran, at the brick kiln where they lived and worked for the previous 18 years.
The mob first beat them with sticks and fists before dragging them to the kiln furnace to set them on fire. Witnesses say one or both of them were still alive as they burned.
A month later, there was only silence on the streets of Chak 59. Villagers who lived alongside the couple said they never knew them. Among their co-workers, some said they were visiting relatives on the day of the attack, others that they had left to observe the religious ritual of Ashura. From grocery-stall vendors to policemen, no one admitted ever meeting, let alone knowing, Shama and Shahzad. Most of the villagers fled after the attack, and many of the rest were locked up in police custody.
Categories: Ahmadis And Pakistan, Anti-Islam Attitude, Asia, Bigotry, Blasphemy, Pakistan