A Council of Progressive Pakistanis has been created in the US, with the objective of contributing to building a progressive and liberal Pakistan.
A meeting of CPP affiliates was held in the greater metropolitan Washington area, Feb 10, 2018, where organizers espoused their vision of building a Pakistan, that would be in keeping with the speech delivered by its founder, Mohammed Ali Jinnah in 1947 before the nation’s constituent assembly.
In his speech Jinnah had said, `You may belong to any religion or caste or creed; that has nothing to do with the business of the State. You will find that in course of time Hindus will cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense as citizens of the State.’
The participants, who included the future council members of the CPP discussed the need to work toward tolerance between religious and ethnic communities, including the removal of laws that discriminate on the basis of religion.
In this regard, they pledged to work against imprisonment, torture, disappearance and extrajudicial killings of their fellow brethren who became victims of intolerance inside Pakistan.
In January, the CPP organizers held a talk in St. Louis, Missouri on `Partition & its Effects,’ based on the early chapters of `Aboard the Democracy Train.’
There, the author made a presentation and answered questions from the audience relating to democracy, human rights, terrorism and the changing international scenario.
Excerpts from the talk & questions and answers can be viewed below:
https://www.facebook.com/vasudha.ravv/videos/544375912594230/
https://www.facebook.com/vasudha.ravv/videos/544394135925741/