Problems With Perception

Pak Sikh expelled for not embracing 'authentic Islam'

[3 May, 2007 l 1202 hrs ISTlPTI]

ISLAMABAD: An Islamist group in Pakistan has forced a Sikh, who had converted to Islam 29 years ago, to leave his village in Peshawar's Tirah Valley after his house was set on fire and his son kidnapped for not embracing "authentic Islam".

Leaders of Ansar-ul-Islam (AI), a religious group in North West Frontier Province's Khyber Agency, was accused of expelling the Tirah-based Sikh for converting to the "Lashkar-e-Islam’s untrue version of Islam".

"Qazi Mehboob and Said Akbar came to me and said my first Islam is not genuine. They said it was tableeghi Islam," said Din Muhammad, who had converted to Islam 29 years ago. The Ansar-ul-Islam leaders also forced his family to leave their native village Landakas in Tirah Valley when he refused to accept their demand to revert to Sikhism or embrace the "authentic Islam" that the Ansar-ul-Islam was practising.

He accused the Ansar-ul-Islam activists of kidnapping one of his four sons and forcing him to a pay a ransom of Rs 200,000 for his release. They also set his house on fire a month ago and seized his land.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Pak_Sikh_expelled_for_not_embracing_authentic_Islam/articleshow/1996590.cms