Islam is the largest and the state religion of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Pakistan has over 236 Million adherents of Islam. As much as 90% of the population follows Sunni Islam. Most Pakistani Sunni Muslims belong to the Hanafi school of jurisprudence, which is represented by the Barelvi and Deobandi traditions.
The Barelvi movement or Barelvism, also known as Ahle Sunnat Barelvi, is a movement within Sunni Islam that adheres to the Hanafi school of jurisprudence and Maturidi school of theology with hundreds of millions of followers, and it encompasses a variety of Sufi orders, including the Chistis, Qadiris, Naqshbandis and Suhrawardis as well as many other orders of Sufism. They consider themselves to be the continuation of Sunni Islamic orthodoxy before the rise of Deobandism and Salafism.
Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi Qadri, known reverentially as A'la Hazrat, was an Indian Islamic scholar and poet who is considered as the founder of the Barelvi movement and the Razvi branch of the Qadri Sufi order.
Glasgow Central Mosque is located on the south bank of the River Clyde in the Gorbals district of central Glasgow. The website "Muslims in Britain" classifies the Glasgow Central Mosque as Deobandi.
Shah Ahmad Noorani Siddiqi was a Pakistani Islamic scholar, mystic, philosopher, revivalist and politician.
Sectarian violence in Pakistan refers to violence directed against people and places in Pakistan motivated by antagonism toward the target's religious sect. As many as 4,000 Shia are estimated to have been killed in sectarian attacks in Pakistan between 1987 and 2007, and thousands more Shia have been killed by Salafi extremists from 2008 to 2014, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW). Sunni Sufis and Barelvis have also suffered from some sectarian violence, with attacks on religious shrines killing hundreds of worshippers, and some Deobandi leaders assassinated. Pakistan minority religious groups, including Hindus, Ahmadis, and Christians, have "faced unprecedented insecurity and persecution" in at least two recent years, according to Human Rights Watch. One significant aspect of the attacks in Pakistan is that militants often target their victims places of worship during prayers or religious services in order to maximize fatalities and to "emphasize the religious dimensions of their attack".
Salman Taseer was a Pakistani businessman and politician, who served as the 26th Governor of Punjab from 2008 until his assassination in 2011.
Muhammad Ilyas Attar Qadri is a Pakistani Islamic scholar who is the founder of Dawat-e-Islami. He belongs to the Qadri order of Sufism.
Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Pakistan also Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam or simply as Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) (Urdu: جمیعت علماءِ اسلام; lit. 'Assembly of Islamic Clerics'; abbr.JUI (F) is an Islamic fundamentalist political party in Pakistan. Established as the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam in 1945, it is the result of a factional split in 1988, F standing for the name of its leader, Fazal-ur-Rehman.
The Sunni Ittehad Council is a political alliance of Islamic political and Barelvi religious parties in Pakistan which represents followers of the school of Sunni Islam.
Majlis-e-Tahaffuz-e-Khatme Nabuwwat is the programmatic name of a Pakistani Barelvi organization and Islamic religious movement in Pakistan aiming to protect the belief in the finality of prophethood of Muhammad based on Quran and Sunnah concept of Khatam an-Nabiyyin. It was founded by Mohammad Abdul Ghafoor Hazarvi in 1950 with Zafar Ali Khan, Abdul Hamid Qadri Badayuni, Khwaja Qamar ul Din Sialvi, Syed Faiz-ul Hassan Shah, Ahmad Saeed Kazmi, Abdul Sattar Khan Niazi, Pir of Manki Sharif Amin ul-Hasanat, Muhammad Karam Shah al-Azhari, Sardar Ahmad Qadri and Muhammad Hussain Naeemi. Later on the prominent Barelvi leaders Shah Ahmad Noorani, Shaikh ul Quran Allama Ghulam Ali Okarvi, Pir Muhammad Alauddin Siddiqui, Muhammad Shafee Okarvi, Syed Shujaat Ali Qadri, Iftikharul Hasan Shah and Khalid Hasan Shah also joined them to oppose the Ahmadiyya Movement.
Mujahid Ali is a Pakistani politician who has been a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan since February 2024. He previously served as a member from August 2018 till January 2023 and from June 2013 to May 2018.
Pir Syed Jamaat Ali Shah was a Pakistani author, Islamic scholar and Sufi saint of the Naqshbandi Order. He presided over the All India Sunni Conference and led the Movement for Shaheed Ganj Mosque. He was a contemporary of Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi, the founder of Barelvi movement.
Malik Mumtaz Hussain Qadri, better known as Mumtaz Qadri, was a terrorist who murdered Salmaan Taseer, Governor of Punjab. Qadri was a commando of the Elite Police and, at the time of the assassination, a member of the squad of personal bodyguards assigned to protect Taseer. A follower of the Barelvi version of Sunni Islam, he assassinated Taseer on 4 January 2011. He claimed to have killed the Governor because Taseer spoke in defense of Asia Bibi, a Pakistani Christian woman convicted of blasphemy and sentenced to death. Qadri was convicted by the Islamabad High Court, sentenced to death and hanged in February 2016.
Central Jamaat-e Ahl-e Sunnat is a congregation and mosque of the Pakistani community in Oslo, Norway with 6,000 members, making it the largest mosque in the country. Within Sunni Islam, the mosque is affiliated with Sufism and the Barelvi movement.
Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan is a far-right Islamist political party in Pakistan. The party was founded by Khadim Hussain Rizvi in August 2015. It was the fifth largest party in Pakistan at the time of the 2018 Pakistani general election, and secured over 2.2 million votes. It failed to win any seat in the National Assembly or the Punjab Assembly, but won three seats in the Sindh Assembly.
Khadim Hussain Rizvi was a Pakistani Islamic scholar and the founder of Tehreek-e-Labbaik, a religiopolitical organization founded in 2015, known to protest against any change to Pakistan's blasphemy law.
Syed Ejaz Hussain Bukhari is a Pakistani politician who is a Member of the Provincial Assembly of the Punjab since 23 February 2024. He served as an assembly member prior to this from 2002 to 2007 and again from May 2013 to May 2018.
Provincial elections were held in Sindh on 8 February 2024 to elect a new provincial legislature. On 5 August 2023, after the approval of the results of the 2023 digital census by the Council of Common Interests headed by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, elections have been delayed for several months, as new delimitations will be published on 14 December 2023. On 2 November 2023, the Election Commission of Pakistan announced, in agreement with the President of Pakistan, Arif Alvi, that the elections should be held on 8 February 2024. This election was held concurrently with nationwide general elections and other provincial elections.
Provincial elections were held in the Pakistani province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on 8 February 2024 to elect members of the 12th Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. On 5 August 2023, the results of the 2023 digital census were approved by the Council of Common Interests headed by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. Therefore, elections have been delayed for several months, as new delimitations will be published on 14 December 2023, as announced by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP). On 2 November 2023, the ECP announced, in agreement with the President of Pakistan, Arif Alvi, that the elections would be held on 8 February 2024. This election was held concurrently with nationwide general elections and other provincial elections.
