by MURTAZA HAIDER
SOURCE/Pew Research Centre, 2012
If Muhammad Ali Jinnah were alive today only half of Pakistan would consider him a Muslim. The ethnic, sectarian, and tribal fault lines have reached such depths that the nation once founded to be the homeland of Muslims is now bickering over who gets to be called a Muslim.
The latest poll by the US-based Pew Research Center has exposed the depth of sectarian fault lines where only one in every two Sunni Muslims in Pakistan accepts Shias as Muslims. While many believed that such extreme sectarian views were held only by the fanatics lying at the margin, the Pew Center’s findings reveal that such intolerant and extremist views are in fact mainstream in Pakistan. Even Jinnah, a Shia Muslim and the founder of Pakistan, today would not have escaped the sectarian extremism in Pakistan.
Based on a comprehensive survey comprising face-to-face interviews with 38,000 Muslims in 39 countries and territories, the Pew Research Center paints a picture of the diverse religious beliefs amongst Muslims. The sectarian strife varies a great deal from Azerbaijan where 90 per cent of Sunnis believe Shias are Muslims to Kosovo where only 20 per cent hold the same view. In Arab countries where Shias account for fewer than 5 per cent of the population (e.g., Jordon, Egypt, and Morocco) the majority believes that Shias are not Muslims. On the other hand Arab countries with significant Shia populations, i.e., Iraq and Lebanon, show signs of sectarian harmony where overwhelming majority of Sunnis accept Shias as Muslims.
The same survey could not be conducted in India, Iran, and Saudi Arabia because of security concerns for the enumerators.
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(Thanks to Sultan Pesnani)