Minorities rights: LAS arranges policy dialogues in Sukkur

SUKKUR: In Pakistan, Minority communities’ access to justice is impeded by direct and indirect discrimination which manifests through societal bigotry, institutional discrimination, gaps in existing legal protections, and a series of laws and policies designed to disempower and threaten their safety and well-being. There are no evidence-based studies that analyze in detail how the court and administrative procedures, judgments, lawyers, and legal processes might be disempowering minorities and creating fear and distrust among the community, which in turn prevents them from relying on the justice system to resolve disputes.

Realizing the sensitivity of the situation, the ‘Religious Minority Project’ of the Legal Aid Society (LAS) strives to ensure that Freedom of Religious Belief (FORB) abuses are prevented for minorities in Pakistan and to promote FORB in Pakistan by strengthening access to justice and rule of law for minorities.

Making persistent efforts, the minority project recently arranged a policy dialogue with administrators, civil society organizations, the legal fraternity, and other stakeholders in the DC House, Sukkur. The LAS project team presented the findings of the research “Case File Analysis- CFA” conducted by LAS on the legal needs of religious minority communities in their attempt to access justice. The research study has been conducted by a comparative study of 80 cases from 8 districts of Sindh on four major categories: matrimonial issues, petty crimes, forced conversions, and blasphemy cases. The purpose of the research was to analyze the structural discrimination and issues pervasive in the legal system with regard to religious minority communities in Pakistan.

The Legal Aid Society is a not-for-profit non-governmental organization which was registered on the 19th of November, 2013 under the Societies Registration Act, of 1860. Justice Nasir Aslam Zahid, former Chief Justice of Sindh and former Supreme Court Judge, founded the organization with the main objective of serving marginalized and underprivileged communities to reduce challenges in accessing justice. Over the last nine years of operations, LAS has spread its operations to 13 judicial districts in the province of Sindh and is functional in Gilgit Baltistan and Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT).  In the short span since its inception, it has gained recognition regionally and internationally as one of the key professional organizations working in the domains of law, justice, and development.