CHENNAI: Responding to the appeal of the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC), a group of prominent social activists belonging to the online forum The Moderates have written to the President of Pakistan urging him to ensure protection to a 12-year-old Christian child and her family who were being harassed by an extremist Islamic group.According to the AHRC report, the child was abducted by two Muslim men in December 2010, raped and forced to marry one of the rapists after conversion to Islam. Despite her father registering an FIR, the police took no action for eight months. After the child’s escape from her kidnappers in September, the banned outfit had pressured the police into threatening the child’s parents with a criminal case if the girl was not returned to her “husband”. Since then the family has been in the hiding both from the police and the rapists.Quoting the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, the AHRC also reported that many girls from the Hindu community are abducted every month, raped, converted to Islam and forced to marry Muslims. And most of the abducted girls are never heard from again.Taking cognizance of these allegations, The Moderates forum has, through an open letter, pointed out to Asif Ali Zardari that “defending and upholding minority rights is one of the foremost responsibilities of a healthy democracy. If your country fails to protect its minorities, it may affect the democratic credentials of your country.” They also wanted the President to help trace all the abducted minority community girls, return them to their families and give them protection.
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