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Heart and Soul: The Trouble with Pakistan's White Stripe: Episode 1

Episode 1

The Trouble with Pakistan's White Stripe

BBC World Service - Heart and Soul, The Trouble with Pakistan's White Stripe, Episode 1

Mobeen Azhar investigates the plight of minority religions in Pakistan.

Minority faiths are becoming increasingly marginalised in Pakistan, Mobeen Azhar investigates their plight.

In 2011 Salman Taseer was shot dead by his own bodyguard Mumtaz Qadri, who is now a national hero, revered by hard-line Muslims.  

Taseer, who was Governor of the state of Punjab, was a critic of Pakistan's blasphemy laws, which many Pakistanis feel are being abused by the Muslim majority to persecute Christians and other minorities.

Mobeen Azhar meets Salman Taseer's daughter Sanam, to hear about his death and how he knew that by speaking out against the laws, his own life would be in danger.  

He travels to Rawalpindi, to Mumtaz Qadri's house, which is now a shrine to him and he will hear from one prominent critic of the laws, who feel the plight of minorities is linked to the future of the country as a whole.

Mobeen Azhar hears how the country's founder Mohammed Jinnah, envisaged a Pakistan where minorities were part of the country - symbolised by the white stripe of the country's flag - but he will question whether that vision is being respected over 60 years since Pakistan was born.

(Image: Pakistan flag. Credit: JEWEL SAMAD/AFP/Getty Images)

Heart and Soul: The Trouble with Pakistan's White Stripe

BBC World Service

The growing persecution of minorities and the power of fundamental Islamists in Pakistan.

Mobeen Azhar looks at the growing persecution of minorities and the power of fundamental Islamists in Pakistan.

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