Sunday, January 04, 2026 | 12:04 PM ISTहिंदी में पढें
Business Standard
Notification Icon
userprofile IconSearch

Islamabad's Christian slum dwellers pray for Christmas miracle

Image

AFP Islamabad
As the winter sun sets on Pakistan's leafy capital Islamabad, residents of the city's largest Christian slum use bicycles, donkey carts and their backs to haul jerry cans filled with water to their homes.

Situated on the capital's periphery, the neighbourhood that is home to around 10,000 people is now at the heart of a debate over the rights of Christians in this predominantly Muslim country of 200 million, with city authorities claiming such settlements threaten "the beauty of Islam".

Local authorities, determined to put an end to what they call "illegal" settlements, have recently sealed the area's three tube wells in what residents say is an effort to drive them out -- despite a Supreme Court injunction temporarily barring their eviction.
 

With the matter now resting before Pakistan's top judges, the slum-dwellers' sense of insecurity remains and many say all they want for Christmas is for their neighbourhood to become legalised -- and the taps turned back on.

"We are worried, we are under a lot of stress but what we can do? We are helpless," sighed 33-year-old housewife Nargis Masih, who has been living in the neighbourhood since it was built two years ago.

Like many others, she said her main concern is a lack of water.

Masih said she would like her family to be able to celebrate Christmas Day without being forced to gather more water from the nearest tap, three kilometres (two miles) away at a bus station.

Christians make up around 1.6 per cent of Pakistan's overwhelmingly Muslim population, with large settlements across major cities and around 60,000 in Islamabad.

They often face discrimination at work and routinely fall victim to the country's blasphemy laws, which rights groups say are often used to carry out personal vendettas.

Indeed, the Islamabad slum is named Rimsha Colony after Pakistani Christian teenager Rimsha Masih, not related to Nargis, who was arrested in 2012 for allegedly desecrating pages of the Koran.

Though the charges were ultimately proven false, Rimsha and her family moved to Canada in the face of ongoing threats from neighbours.

Christians in her neighbourhood of Mehrabadi on the outskirts of Islamabad were also forced to leave their homes, and the government gave them the Rimsha plot of land closer to the city to rebuild their lives.

Despite lofty promises made by the former government to safeguard their rights, Rimsha Colony remains unconnected to the electric and sewage grids, though it was supplied with water by three wells until a few weeks ago.

Don't miss the most important news and views of the day. Get them on our Telegram channel

First Published: Dec 25 2015 | 10:57 PM IST

Explore News