Secret plea from victim of blasphemy laws

The family of this Pakistani Christian rights activist secretly videoed his plea for help, under the noses of the prison guards.  The interview is from about 0:55 on, and shows the desperate situation and how effective false accusations of blasphemy, particularly against bread-winners.  In addition it tells of the mistreatment (denial of medication, discrimination and torture) he suffers in prison.

In addition BPCA has seen plea's for prayer for the bail hearing of Mr.Khuram Masih, who has been falsely charged with blasphemy and held in prison for 9 months.  His hearing is in Lahore High court on the 28th of August.

Good and bad news in Pakistani education

For one girls school in the city of Rawalpindi, terror came in the form of 60-70 masked men bursting in brandishing metal bars. The men beat the students and some of the teachers, warning them to 'dress modestly and wear hijabs' or else face the consequences. This terrorist attack resulted in low or non-attendance across the region, with all schools shut down the day after the attack. The schools are helpless in the face of this kind of attack, and more appalling and telling is the comment of an (understandably) anonymous police officer, who stated that 'We were under strict instructions to do nothing'. In other words, for whatever reason, powerlessness, fear, or complicity on the part of the authorities, the authorities essentially colluded with this shameful violation of the Pakistani education system.

On a more positive note, Christian legal advocates have earlier been successful in their writ in the Lahore high court in correcting a gross imbalance in a school text book. The chapter on ethics contained the life history of every prophet, except the life of Jesus. The court ordered that material be put into the book and according to Raja Nathaniel Gill, the revised textbook is now available on the markets

High Court petition

We received a prayer request from a lawyer in Lahore. Unfortunately it was too late to post on time, for the hearing, but we put details here, as the decision may not have yet been made.

The lawyer, Nathaniel Gill, had a hearing for his arguments at the Lahore High Court at 9am Monday 22nd August. He is requesting that sections on the contributions of Christians to the nation of Pakistan would be added to history and educational text books, as the many contributions of Christians are not mentioned at all in such works.

Please pray that his arguments would win favour, and that the courts would grant his request, and that the Department of Education would comply and add such material fairly and quickly.