Aftab Mughal
Taliban forces have seized the homes and businesses of Sikhs living in the Northwestern Frontier Province of Pakistan. Infidels must pay a head tax. Many Sikh families have been forced to leave their homes in the Orakzai area of Pakistan.
Sikhs constitute a tiny religious minority in Pakistan. The latest Sikh nightmare began when Pakistan’s parliament passed the Sharia law for the Malakand Division of the Northwestern Frontier Province. On the very next day, April 14, 2009, the Taliban imposed a prodigious multi-million rupee Jazia (an Islamic tax to non-Muslims) on the Sikh community.
The Taliban said Sikhs are an unwanted minority and must pay the head tax in exchange for living in the area under the rule of Sharia. Following the Taliban’s threat, many Sikh families of the Feroze Khel area of Merozai in Lower Orakzai Agency simply fled.
The Taliban had also forcibly occupied shops of two Sikh businessmen and houses of several Sikhs to force them to pay the Jazia. Some families paid as much as 20 million rupees to Taliban forces to avoid further retaliation. After receiving Jazia tax, the Taliban released Sikh leader Sardar Saiwang Singh and vacated the occupied homes.
However, other families were given a deadline to pay the Jazia. To prove their point, Taliban terrorists on April 29 demolished 11 homes and forcibly occupied three houses and 10 shops of the Sikh community for refusing to pay. The action was ordered by the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan chief for Orakzai Agency, Hakeemullah Mehsud, after the first deadline for payment of Jazia passed.
Local Muslims strongly condemned the Taliban actions. Some tribesmen of Manikhel announced that they would protect 63 displaced Sikhs, and gave refuge. Sikhs had been living in the area for over a hundred years, but remain a tiny minority in the region.
(The Cutting Edge News)
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