On an average 25 cases a month are reported of forced conversions and marriage of Hindu girls in Sindh. The usual procedure is to first kidnap the girl, force her to become Muslim and marry her off immediately. In the meantime, parents of the girl are still attempting to file an FIR at the nearest police station.
The police is in no hurry to file the FIR, but this is their normal practice in all kinds of crime cases from theft of cattle, to kidnapping to murder. Hindus therefore should not conclude that the reluctance to register a complaint is proof that police is in cahoots with the kidnappers. There are two reasons why police dilly dally.
First, an FIR means work. FIR stands for First Information Report and registering it means having to investigate if the information is true or false. As you are aware, it is anathema for any government, semi-government authority to work. Second, they like to show a clean register to their superiors as proof that there is little or no crime in their respective remits.
The speed with which abducted girls are forced to convert and married off, weighed against the delay in start of investigation of the crime, is a reason why nothing of significance is done to end the menace. Politicians, magistrates, legislators and the government seem to think that once married off there is little point in pursuing the case. This is outrageous miscarriage of justice.
The ploy to get the girls married off quickly is proof of religious fanatics masterminding crimes on three counts: kidnapping, forced conversion and forced marriage. Neither God nor the law of the land allow it. There is no control of the fanatics. Ridiculous orders are issued which cannot stop the crime against the Hindu community, such as President Zardari's order for the recovery of kidnapped Hindu girls. Who will do that, the Police? Ha, ha.
Furthermore the President knows very well that nothing will be done. He perhaps thinks his responsibility of protecting citizens is restricted to issuing orders; and that it is not his concern if the order is not implemented. Just how sure the fanatics are that they will get away without punishment, just how powerful they are, we see everyday outside the Karachi Press Club where protesters for any cause whatsoever descend in hordes to scream their demands on loud loudspeakers. If the protesters happen to be, say, teachers agitating for regularisation of their service, the police force attacks them as if they were enemies of the country.
Water cannons and tear gas is used to disperse them and some protesters are taken into custody. But when a fanatic group turns up, even if they happen to be a banned organisation, the police never does anything to disrupt their venomous activity. Quick marriage is a new ploy for ensuring the converted girl stays in the fold of fanatic. It is a certain guarantee that the case of kidnapping will fizzle out. They perhaps learnt this from the case of Manoo Bhil who agitated ten long years for the recovery of kidnapped women of his family.
It is the reason why they have given up kidnapping and forcing conversion of men married women or boys. (some of the women of Manoo Bhil's kidnapped women were married and some male members of his tribe had been forcefully converted to support the kidnappers.) It also indicates the fanatics are well organised and have ready a bridegroom so that the kidnapped girl can be married off as soon as she is in their clutches. Marriage changes the attitude of the girls too. They feel it is no use protesting anymore.
Sindh's Badin and Tharparkar districts have the largest concentration of Hindus. In some places, such as Nagarpakar, Hindus are the majority population. Minority status has denied Hindu Sindhis too many rights, so that even girls of Hindu families which are important or well-to-do or MPAs in the Sindh Assembly or tribe leaders like Manoo Bhil, are vulnerable. For instance, Dr Lata Kumari, daughter of Dr Ramesh Kumar was pursuing higher studies in medicine in Karachi when she was kidnapped by a man said to be a judge's son.
The media highlighted the kidnapping and conversion of Rinkle Kumari whose father is a school teacher. Also in the limelight is the case of Asha Mohandas and Bharti Narainder. Even these four cases would not have been highlighted but for the fact the chairman of Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, Amarnath Motumal is himself a Hindu. In short, Muslims are not moved by the plight of Hindu girls one way or another.