Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan (JIP), is a Pakistani Islamist political party. It is the Pakistani successor to Jamaat-e-Islami, which was founded in colonial India in 1941. JIP is a "vanguard party", whose members are intended to be leaders spreading party beliefs and influence. Supporters not thought qualified to be members may become "affiliates", and beneath them are "sympathizers". The party leader is called an "ameer". Although, it does not have a large popular following, the party is quite influential and considered one of the major Islamic movements in Pakistan, along with Deobandi and Barelvi.
Islam is the largest and the state religion of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Pakistan has over 231.6 Million adherents of Islam. As much as 90% of the population follows Sunni Islam and around 97% of Pakistanis follow Islam. Most Pakistani Sunni Muslims belong to the Hanafi school of jurisprudence, which is represented by the Barelvi and Deobandi traditions.
Islamization or Shariazation, has a long history in Pakistan since the 1950s, but it became the primary policy, or "centerpiece" of the government of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, the ruler of Pakistan from 1977 until his death in 1988.
India since its independence in 1947 has been a secular state. The secular values were enshrined in the constitution of India. India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru is credited with the formation of the secular republic in the modern history of the country. With the Forty-second Amendment of the Constitution of India enacted in 1976, the Preamble to the Constitution asserted that India is a secular nation. However, the Supreme Court of India in the 1994 case S. R. Bommai v. Union of India established the fact that India was secular since the formation of the republic. The judgement established that there is separation of state and religion. It stated "In matters of State, religion has no place. Any State government which pursues nonsecular on policies or nonsecular course of action acts contrary to the constitutional mandate and renders itself amenable to action under Article 356". Furthermore, constitutionally, state-owned educational institutions are prohibited from imparting religious instructions, and Article 27 of the constitution prohibits using tax-payers money for the promotion of any religion.
The two-nation theory was an ideology of religious nationalism that advocated Muslim Indian nationhood, with separate homelands for Indian Muslims and Indian Hindus within a decolonised British India, which ultimately led to the Partition of India in 1947. Its various descriptions of religious differences were the main factor in Muslim separatist thought in the Indian subcontinent, asserting that Indian Muslims and Indian Hindus are two separate nations, each with their own customs, traditions, art, architecture, literature, interests, and ways of life.
From a historical perspective, Professor Ishtiaq Ahmed of the University of Stockholm and Professor Shamsul Islam of the University of Delhi classified the Muslims of Colonial India into two categories during the era of the Indian independence movement: nationalist Muslims and Muslim nationalists. The All India Azad Muslim Conference represented nationalist Muslims, while the All-India Muslim League represented the Muslim nationalists. One such popular debate was the Madani–Iqbal debate.
The Objectives Resolution was adopted by the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on March 12, 1949. The resolution proclaimed that the future constitution of Pakistan would not be modeled entirely on a European pattern, but on the ideology and democratic faith of Islam. The resolution, in its entirety, has been made part of the Constitution of Pakistan under Article 2(A).
In Turkey, secularism or laicism was first introduced with the 1928 amendment of the Constitution of 1924, which removed the provision declaring that the "Religion of the State is Islam", and with the later reforms of Turkey's first president Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, which set the administrative and political requirements to create a modern, democratic, secular state, aligned with Kemalism.
The United Nations categorizes Bangladesh as a moderate democratic Muslim country. Sunni Islam is the largest religion in the country and in all of its districts, except Rangamati. The Constitution of Bangladesh refers to Islam twice: the document begins with the Islamic phrase Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem and article (2A), added later, declares that: "Islam is the state religion of the republic".
Muhammad Ali Jinnah's 11 August Speech is a speech made by Muhammad Ali Jinnah, founding father of Pakistan and known as Quaid-e-Azam to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan. While Pakistan was created as a result of what could be described as Indian Muslim nationalism, Jinnah was once an ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity. When the Partition of India finally occurred, Jinnah, soon-to-be Governor-General of the Dominion of Pakistan, outlined his vision of Pakistan in an address to the Constituent Assembly, delivered on 11 August 1947. He spoke of an inclusive and impartial government, religious freedom, rule of law ,and equality for all.
The Constitution of Bangladesh includes secularism as one of the four fundamental principles, despite having Islam as the state religion by 2A. Islam is referred to twice in the introduction and Part I of the constitution and the document begins with the Islamic phrase Basmala which in English is translated as “In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful” and article (2A) declares that :"Islam is the state religion of the republic". Bangladesh is mostly governed by secular laws, set up during the times when the region was ruled by the British Crown.
Secularism—that is, the separation of religion from civic affairs and the state—has been a controversial concept in Islamic political thought, owing in part to historical factors and in part to the ambiguity of the concept itself. In the Muslim world, the notion has acquired strong negative connotations due to its association with removal of Islamic influences from the legal and political spheres under foreign colonial domination, as well as attempts to restrict public religious expression by some secularist nation states. Thus, secularism has often been perceived as a foreign ideology imposed by invaders and perpetuated by post-colonial ruling elites, and is frequently understood to be equivalent to irreligion or anti-religion.
The Pakistani textbooks controversy refers to claimed inaccuracies and historical denialism. The inaccuracies and myths promote religious intolerance and Indophobia and lead to calls for curriculum reform. According to the Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Pakistan's school textbooks have systematically inculcated anti-Indian discrimination through historical omissions and deliberate misinformation since the 1970s.
Religious discrimination in Pakistan is a serious issue for the human rights situation in modern-day Pakistan. Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, Shias, and Qadiyanis among other religious minorities often face discrimination and at times are even subjected to violence. In some cases Christian churches and the worshippers themselves have been attacked. Although, there is very little record of this. Khawaja Nazimuddin, the 2nd Prime Minister of Pakistan, stated: "I do not agree that religion is a private affair of the individual nor do I agree that in an Islamic state every citizen has identical rights, no matter what his caste, creed or faith be".
The history of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan began on 14 August 1947 when the country came into being in the form of Dominion of Pakistan within the British Commonwealth as the result of Pakistan Movement and the partition of India. While the history of the Pakistani Nation according to the Pakistan government's official chronology started with the Islamic rule over Indian subcontinent by Muhammad bin Qasim which reached its zenith during Mughal Era. In 1947, Pakistan consisted of West Pakistan and East Pakistan. The President of All-India Muslim League and later the Pakistan Muslim League, Muhammad Ali Jinnah became Governor-General while the secretary general of the Muslim League, Liaquat Ali Khan became Prime Minister. The constitution of 1956 made Pakistan an Islamic democratic country.
Muhammad Ali Jinnah was a barrister, politician, and the founder of Pakistan. Jinnah served as the leader of the All-India Muslim League from 1913 until the inception of Pakistan on 14 August 1947 and then as the Republic of Pakistan's first governor-general until his death.
Secularism in Bangladesh is known as "neutrality of religion" under Bangladeshi law. In the Constitution of Bangladesh, secularism is mentioned in the preamble as one of the fundamental principles of Bangladeshi law. Article 8 enshrines secularism as one of the fundamental principles of state policy. And yet, after the assassination of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 1975, Bangladesh went to military rule, and in 1979 removed the term secular from their constitution. Article 12 elaborates further on secularism and freedom of religion.
Conservatism in Pakistan generally relates to the traditional, social, and religious identities in the politics of Pakistan. American historian Stephen Cohen describes several political constants in Pakistan's conservatism: respect for tradition, the rule of law and the Islamic religion which is integral in the idea of Pakistan.
Secularism in Tunisia is an ideological and political movement aiming at defining the relationship between religion and state and the place of religion in society during an ongoing modernization. The Tunisian Constitution of 2014 affirmed Tunisia as a civil state founded on citizenship. It also declared Islam as Tunisia's religion. The following religious festivals are recognized as national holidays: the Islamic New Year, the birth of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, Eid al-Fitr, and Eid al-Adha.
Ziaism is a political ideology implemented in Pakistan from 1978 to 1988 by Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq. The ideology endorses the idea of an Islamic state, influenced heavily by religion. It includes Islamic laws, industrialisation, militarism and authoritarianism. Zia and his doctrine are widely credited with making political Islam an influential movement within Pakistan, turning a relatively secular country into one that was based on Islamic law.
