Before the birth of Pakistan, persecution against the Ahmadis was minimal, partly because Muslims in general were a minority in the Indian political sphere. After the partition, it was difficult for Pakistan to be a secular and inclusive country because of the exceeding pressure from fundamentalist groups and orthodox members of society. Muslim fundamentalist groups felt that the purpose for the creation of Pakistan was to be an Islamic state and they felt that this Islamic state should not include the Ahmadiyya community since they were not considered “true Muslims.” The purpose of Pakistan was not to create an exclusively Sunni country, but one in which all people who profess to the religion of Islam in the subcontinent could practice their religion. Although there is the discrepancy between the beliefs of mainstream Sunni and Ahmadiyya sects, the important point to consider is that the Ahmadi community call themselves Muslim and label their faith as Islam.

Before the separation of India and Pakistan, Muslims were a minority and desired that the constitution of India include laws that guaranteed them protection. It is often argued that the protection of religious minorities was a large reason for partition. After the partition, the All India Muslim League demanded that the large number of Muslims that did not leave India have constitutionally secured protections. To reciprocate, the All India Muslim League was to offer similar protections to Non-Muslims in Pakistan (Khan 222). In accordance with Jinnah’s vision of minority rights, the founding documents of Pakistan provided for the protection of religious minorities in Pakistan. The 1956 constitution highlighted some laws that would offer such protection as dictated in Article 20, “the right of each citizen to profess practice and propagate his religion”, Article 22, “to attend school without religious instruction”, Article 26, “to seek public recreation without religious prejudice”, Article 27, “to hold positions in the government of Pakistan”, and Article 28, “to uphold and enjoy one’s unique language or culture without religious discrimination” (Khan 222). Such laws guaranteed the rights of religious minorities. At the constituent assembly of March 7, 1949, Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan pointed out that Pakistan was established because the Muslims in the Sub-continent desired to lead their lives in accordance with the teachings and practices of Islam (Kaushik 33). He also stated that a country based on Islamic principles would not be theocratic because Islam does not recognize either priesthood or sacerdotal authority and hence theocracy does not apply to Islam (Kaushik 33). Several days after Khan’s statement, the Muslim league parliamentary party drafted the “objective Resolution.” The Objectives Resolution began with the preamble
“ In the name of Allah the beneficent, the merciful: whereas sovereignty over the entire universe belongs to God almighty alone and the authority which he has delegated to the state of Pakistan through its people for being exercised within the limit prescribed by him is a sacred trust wherein the Muslims shall be enabled to order their lives in the individual and collective spheres in accord with the teaching and requirement of Islam as set out in the Holy Quran and the Sunnah…(URL)”

This resolution was accepted without any difficulty under the leadership of Liaquat Ali Khan. Even though the prime minister confirmed that the objective’s resolution was not aiming to establish a theocratic state in Pakistan, the fundamentalist group, the Jammat-i-islami were adamant about orienting Pakistan’s future constitution in terms of Islamic beliefs. Just before the objectives resolution was being presented to the Constituent Assembly, Mawdudi(the leader of the Jammat-i-Islami) ordered two Jamat leaders, Abdu’l-Jabbar Ghazi and Abdu’l Ghaffar Hasan to influence the content of the objectives resolution (Nasr 123). These men were especially powerful because they tried to create an alliance of Ulama groups by creating strong ties with Mawlana Uthami, who was a member of the constituent assembly (Nasr 123). Uthami, as a member of the constituent assembly, was nearly a direct voice of the values of the Jammat-i-islami. In Mawdudi’s eyes, this was a move to secularize the state and soon there came a demand for an Islamic state which suddenly became a need for an Islamic constitution (Nasr 122). In this way the desires of the fundamentalist groups were preserved from the beginning through cunning political tactics. Many fundamentalist groups felt that this was only the beginning of diverting the values of the Pakistani government in a religious direction.

Another fundamental group that took advantage of the Objectives Resolution were the Ahrars, who were a Muslim Separatist movement. They found it to be a perfect time to establish their power on the Pakistani political front. Therefore, soon after the establishment of the resolution, the majlis-ahrar-e-islam (ahrar) began to engage in anti-Ahmadi campaigning (Kaushik 25). The Ahrar had been highly critical of the Ahmadiyyas since the 1930’s, and had launched a campaign against the Ahmadiyyas to disturb their missionary activities in Punjab and Kashmir. On May 1, 1949, Ahrar activists made their opinions public by denouncing Ahmadis and professing them to be a non-Muslim minority. They demanded that Chaudry Zafrullah Khan, the foreign minister of Pakistan, be removed from his position in the cabinet and that any Ahmadi involved in public service be eliminated as well (Kaushik 25). Maulvi GhulamUllah Khan described the founder of the Ahmadiyya sect as a Dajjal – or “dark messiah” - which was “created by the British to disrupt Islamic solidarity” (Kaushik 25). He “alleged that the Qadianis particularly Chaudry Zaffrullah Khan were causing great damage to Pakistan and the Muslim community and that they were plotting to barter away Kashmir for Qadian” (Kaushik 25). To control the activities of the Ahrars, Quaid-i-Azam Jinnah led the Muslim league to stern action against the Ahrars in a meeting on December of 1949 (Lavan 193).

The negative sentiments that prevailed against Ahmadis were further exacerbated by the actions of the Ahrar group in particular. In a meeting held in Faisalabad, many leaders of the Ahrar movement made speeches that violated section 153-A of the Pakistan penal code and section 21 of the Punjab Safety Act (Kaushik 30). Legal action was not taken against the Ahrar because it would have amounted to martyrdom, according to a legal advisor. The advisor stated

“ They (the Ahrars) have made the Ahmadiyya the target of their attack in order to gain a hearing from the public. They are trying to exploit the religious feelings of an average Musalman against the Ahmadiyyas but I do not think it would be advisable to take any action against the Ahrars for the present as the Muslims are very touchy on the point of Ahmadism and to prosecute the Ahrars for their vituperations against the Ahmadiyyas would give them an air of martyrdom in the eyes of public which they do not deserve. It would therefore advise any action against the Ahrar leaders for the present (Kaushik 26).”

According to the statement, the power held by the Ahrar was one of the main reasons why the government could not intervene. They felt that interfering with the situation would only worsen the circumstances for Ahmadis. Additionally, the effect of the Ahrars on the people of Pakistan is clearly visible through this statement. The legal advisor who made this statement felt that the fervor of the Ahrars would greatly influence the general population of Pakistan.

Due to the government’s passivity during this time of unjust treatment of Ahmadiyya, such fundamentalist groups saw an opportunity to strike again. Soon after, another Tabligh conference was held in January 1950, where the members of Ahrar continued to denounce Khan and Mirza Ghulam Ahmad and the Ahmadiyya community in spite of warnings by the government. The Ahrars published a pamphlet labeled “Ash-Shahab” intended to gain support from the conservative and orthodox members of the Muslim community (Kaushik 26). In the pamphlet, it stated that the Ahmadiyyas were heretics and that according to the Sharia the punishment for committing heresy was death by stoning (Kaushik 26). The spread of this pamphlet began to cause violence to the Ahmadiyya members of the community. Again, any type of propaganda that these fundamentalist groups could think of was utilized to its full potential. The object of this kind of propaganda was to create and heighten hostility between mainstream Muslims (in particular Sunnis) and Ahmadis.
As the decade progressed, violence against the Ahmadiyya community increased steadily. By July 1952, the Muslim League who were in rule at the time collaborated with the right wing fundamentalist in implementing an anti-Ahmadiyya agitation (Kaushik 32). After using various methods of anti-Ahmadiyya propaganda, various orthodox and highly conservative members stumbled upon a novel way to influence the government and the local people of Pakistan. The issue of “khatam-i-nabuwat” was utilized, which stressed that the prophethood (Nabuwat) ended with the death of Prophet Muhammad and that Mirza Ghulam’s professed prophethood contradicted the belief of “khatam-i-nabuwat.” The president of the Punjab Muslim League in 1950 issued a statement:
“ The council of the Punjab Muslim League is fully conscious of the truth that khatm-i-nabuwat is one of those fundamental articles of the Islamic faith which have knit together Muslims of the world into a spiritual brotherhood and provided a strong basis for the unity and solidarity of the Muslim nation in Pakistan. This truth carries with it the obvious and natural implication that non-subscribers to the doctrine of Khatm-i-nabuwat have a fundamental difference with what Islam stands for in the domain of religious belief….that the Ahmadiyyas who have a fundamental difference of attitude on a question of faith should be classed as non-Muslim minority in the constitution of Pakistan (Kaushik 33).”

By touching on such a sensitive issue amongst mainstream Sunnis, the fundamentalists could easily get their point across to the general public and influence the laws that were being shaped. Although it might be true that the Ahmadiyya community differed a bit in their theological belief, they still considered themselves to be a part of the general Muslim community. This statement clearly denounced the Ahmadiyya’s attachment to the Muslim faith and categorized them separately into non-Muslims. In doing so, it took the existing prejudices towards the Ahmadiyya’s and transcribed them into the most key legal document in the lives of all Pakistan’s citizens. By using the khatam-e-nabuwat idea, these fundamentalist forces knew they would be appealing to the core belief of the majority of the population in Pakistan. This would later prove to help them in further persecution of the Ahmadiyya community. The effect of the Muslim League’s statement was quickly apparent within the views of chief governmental officers at the time. Soon after, the chief minister also denounced the Ahmadiyas publically; Mian Mumtaz Daulatana said
“ In the matter of Khatm-i-Nabuwat, I have the same belief which a Musalman should have. According to me all those who do not believe the prophet to be the last prophets are outside the pale of Islam. I go further to say that to raise any argument on the doctrine of khatm-i-nabuwat itself amount to kufr because an argument is possible only where a matter admits of some doubt. The belief in khatm-i-nabwat is part of our faith and it is above all argument and logic. The Mirzais are themselves responsible for the hatred that has been created against them because of their separatist tendencies (Kaushik 33).”

Along with arguments against Ahmadis used earlier by the Muslim league members and other fundamentalist groups, any propaganda that would put the Ahmadiyya community in a negative light was utilized to its fullest extent. In one case, the Ahmadis were accused of being separatists because of their beliefs. Any juicy negative idea that these fundamentalist groups could get their hands on was used to oppose the Ahmadiyya community.
After the first draft of the constitution was assembled, the fundamentalist forces opposed it and accused Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan of violating the Quranic norms and imposing a constitution based on Western ideals, since this draft protected the rights of minority religious groups (Kaushik 22). In October 1951, Prime Minister Liaqat Ali Khan was assassinated, allegedly by a fundamentalist who belonged to the Jammat-i-islami (Kaushik 22). After the deaths of Liaqat Ali Khan and M.A. Jinnah, the modernists and liberals were severely shaken. The next Prime Minister, Khwaja Nazim-ud-Din, promised to uphold the values of his predecessors but began to feel the pressures of the orthodox and conservative forces even as he stepped into the office.
The anti-Ahmadi propagation progressed in a linear fashion in the early 50’s while Pakistan’s constitution was still in infancy. In 1953 the Muslim Parties convention, organized primarily by the Ahrars, decided to order the Prime Minister at the time, Khwajah Nazim-ud-Din, to proclaim Ahmadiyyas as a Non-Muslim minority within a month (Kaushik 34). The members of the party also asked the Prime Minister to discharge Zaffarullah Khan from his position as Foreign Minister (Nasr 133). According to the Ahrars and various other fundamentalist groups of the sort, it was felt that Khan was one of many Ahmadis trying to taking over the government of Pakistan (Nasr 132). The presence of Khan in the government seemed to confirm this idea and caught the attention of many concerned citizens. A few days later, the second meeting of the All Muslim party’s convention was held and a resolution was passed that stated,
“ Since in view of the attitude of Khwaja Nazim-ud-din, prime minister of Pakistan, there is no hope of the demands in respect of the Mirzais being accepted, the Al Muslim Parties convention come to the conclusion that in the circumstances rast iqdamn (direct action) has become inevitable to secure acceptance of the demands; that since the government is not prepared to declare the Mirzais a non-Muslim minority it has become necessary to adopt means to exclude the Mirzai sect from the Millat-i-islamia and one of these means is to boycott this sect totally and expeditiously; that since the demand for the removal of Sir Zafrullah khan, the Mirzai foreign minister has not yet been concede, the Convention demands the resignation of Prime minister Khawajah Nazim-ud-Din so that the Muslims of Pakistan should be able to follow and preserve their religious beliefs and Islamic traditions; and that in order to give a practical shape to the demands mentioned above, the convention proposes that it should make leading Musalmans and the representatives of different religious parties members of the general council(Kaushik 34 ).”

When a response from the prime minister was not forthcoming, the party reiterated their desires and concerns through such a resolution. The Ahmadiyya community were not hindering mainstream Muslims from “preserving and following their religious beliefs” by following a little different form of Islam. Once again, it was repeated that the Ahamdiyya population was not Muslim. This resolution was not supported by the Amir (“head”) of Jamat-i-islami, Maulana Abul Ala Maudoodi, who preferred to utilize the constitution to deal with the Ahmadiyya issue (Nasr 133). The response by the Prime Minister was to basically ignore the demand of the leader of the Majlis-i-Aamal, and he later informed the party that there would be severe penalties if they tampered with the law (Kaushik 35).
In the early 50s, there were many violent occurrences in Punjab. Massive anti-Ahmadiyya riots took place in Lahore, the capital of Punjab, heightened by the publishing of Qadiyani Mas’alah, or the Ahmadi Problem (Nasr 136). These resulted in the establishment of martial law in Lahore. As a result, in 1953, a commission lead by Justice Mohammad Munir was appointed to inquire about the violence that occurred in Punjab. After a year, the Munir Commission presented a cursory examination of the Punjab occurrences. In a detailed report, the Munir commission “strongly condemned fundamentalist elements for parochial and biased interpretation of Islam” (Kaushik 36). It suggested in the report that a conservative and orthodox interpretation of Islam would create strong divisions in the country. The report also stated that the development of Pakistan as a country was impeded by the blending of politics and Islamic parties (Nasr 138). Since the formation of Pakistan, these fundamental Islamic parties had forced their way into the politics of the government. Anything that got in the way of establishing a purely Islamic state would suffer severe consequences, as the Ahmadiyya population did later throughout the 20th century.
Even though the fundamentalists claimed to be a popular voice in the country, their position in the Provincial Assembly was trivial. In 1954, the Jammat-i-islami only held one seat out of 197 in the Punjab Legislative Assembly (Kaushik 37). It seemed as though the conservative forces were beaten in their struggle for a reformed Islamic constitution. Soon after, there was a new Prime Minister in office, General Ayub Khan. His vision for Pakistan was a secular and modern one. He believed that theocratic and strict interpretation of Islam would negatively affect the development of Pakistan (Wilcox 158). Because of these developments, the influence of the various fundamental groups did not affect the policies towards the Ahmadis in that time period. In the next two decades, the anti-Ahmadiyya movement led by the same conservative forces was not successful because the bureaucratic and military government forced restrictions on religious parties (Wilcox 162). On May 3, 1959, Khan addressed a group of Ulama members and reiterated the importance of interpreting “religion in ways that were more relevant to the country’s developmental agenda ” (Nasr 150). Since Khan wanted Pakistan to progress in a secular direction, his values directly contradicted those of the fundamentalist groups. Such groups could then not bother the Ahmadiyya community because there was minimal support from the government. Instead, there were efforts from the government to eliminate the Jammat-i- Islami from any political power (Nasr 150). The military regimes of General Ayub Khan and General Yahya Khan controlled the fundamentalist groups, and in their period of rule the ill-treatment of the Ahmadiyyas was minimal (Kaushik 40).
Soon after the military rule ended, the fundamental religious groups regained momentum and created new obstacles for political leaders. As soon as incoming Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto took office, the fundamentalist leaders again demanded an Islamic constitution. During Bhutto’s rule, Islamic reform had a prominent position in the public sphere (Kennedy 62). Under Bhutto, Article 1 in the constitution designated the country an “Islamic republic of Pakistan” and Article 2 declared “Islam as the state religion” (Kaushik 41). The fundamentalist groups were not yet satisfied, however, and continued pushing for a more rigid Islamic constitution. Such groups believed that Bhutto was enjoying the “financial and organizational” backing of the Ahmadiyya population (Nasr 172). These group’s concerns were worsened in 1973 when one of the positions of the preamble of the constitution was reformed to protect the rights of minorities, proposing that “adequate provision shall be made to safeguard the legitimate interests of minorities and backward and depressed classes” (Kaushik 41). The Jammat-i-Islami renewed its strength as Islamic policies resurfaced in the political arena during Bhutto’s time in office (Nasr 176). Since the direction of Pakistan was tilted towards the Islamic route once again, Bhutto felt pressure from the fundamental groups as well as student organizations (such as the IJT) and there were increasing anti-Ahmadiyya sentiments.
Around the same time, The Majlis Tahaffuz-Khatam-i-Nabuwat (MTKN) was formed by various religious groups in Pakistan in 1974. Its main goal was to guard and preserve the chief Islamic principle of the finality of prophethood of Hazrat Mohammad (Kaushik 43). After regaining momentum, Islamic extremists had found an outlet to taunt the Ahmadiyya population again. The MTKN professed the need for the declaration of Ahmadiyya as a non-Muslim minority (Kaushik 44). In support of the MTKN, a fevered campaign to further the demands of fundamentalist elements began. To take full advantage of the opportunity, MTKN started circulating Chattan, which contained articles, pictures and reports demanding an absolute outlaw of Qadianis in government jobs (Khaushik 44). In 1974, Bhutto said that the feelings and concerns of the Muslims in Pakistan should be protected, and went on to outline five ways in which he could implement anti-Ahmadiyya policies (Kaushik 48). Bhutto later tried to take control of the situation by confronting the right wing about the ill-treatment of Ahmadis, but the group’s influence was too great to be easily quieted.
In September 1974, the National Assembly and the senate passed the constitution’s Second Amendment, which stated that “non-believers in the absolute and unqualified finality” of the prophet Mohammad would not be considered Muslims (Khan 225). In defense of the constitutional amendment, Bhutto stated “that previous regimes have suppressed the problem rather than resolving it…Pakistan is a Muslim state, it came into being because the Muslims of the sub-continent wanted a separate homeland” (Kaushik 51). After the change in the constitution, Bhutto gained support from the fundamentalist religious groups who commended him for his policies against the Ahmadiyya people. After the reform of the second constitution, leading ulama and various religious groups felt that the reform was the beginning of an implementation of a series of changes and not a conclusion to the “Ahmadiyya problem”. Warnings were issued to the Ahmadiyya community which gave the Ahmadiyya an ultimatum. They were either to acknowledge Prophet Mohammad as the last prophet or they should depart Pakistan (Kaushik 52). Even though Bhutto consented to the requests of the fundamentalist groups in terms of implementing anti-Ahmadiyya policies, he was eventually forced out of office by the same factions. With the support of the Paksitan National Alliance (PNA), the chief of the Army Staff, General Zia-ul-Haque removed Bhutto from office (Kennedy 63). In turn, he was to be the next General Head of the Pakistani Government.
The period of Haque’s rule is often referred to as a time of “Islamization in Pakistan.” During Zia’s rule, the goal of his government was to transform Pakistan into a “truly Islamic” nation. Zia promised rapid and thorough interjection of Islam in the political arena (Kennedy 65). Not surprisingly, Haque’s term in office would prove to be the harshest in its policies against Ahmadis. After the inauguration of Haque as President, one of the first political changes regarding minorities was the replacement of the joint-electorates by a separate electorate system for non-Muslim minorities (Kaushik 58). The novel system stated that only Muslims voters could vote for Muslim seats and similarly the non-Muslim community would only be able to vote for minority seats on the basis of direct vote. Thus, the representations of minorities in office would be minimal. After this amendment was put into place, the seats in the National and provincial assemblies consisted of 200 Muslim seats, 8 minority seats and 10 seats reserved for women (Kaushik 59). This further decreased the Ahmadiyya participation in the Pakistani government and encouraged implementation of stricter rules on the Ahmadis. The members of the All-Pakistan Khatam-e-Nabuwat conference held on September 8, 1982 requested that General Zia enforce a Martial law ordinance to make it illegal for the Ahmadiyya community to refer to themselves as “Muslims” and to instead label themselves “Ahmadiyya Muslims” (Kaushik 62). In this way, the Ahmadiyya community was systematically removed from the Islamic sphere in Pakistan.
A cluster of fundamentalist groups collaborated and organized The Khatam-e-Nabuwat conference in January 1984, where it was demanded that certain policies regarding Ahmadiyyas be implemented in Pakistani law (Khaushik 63). A spokesperson at the conference insisted that officials should practice “immediate implementation of the Islamic punishment for apostasy which is not less than death sentence; complete ban on the publication and distribution of Ahmadiyya literature; and immediate steps be taken to check the anti-national activities of the Ahmadiyyas” (Kaushik 63). Conservative groups continued to escalate the pressure to implement policies they desired. In February 1984, the orthodox Ulama warned the government that if their demands were not met by 30 April 1984, they would commence a national anti-Ahmadiyya movement (Kaushik 64). During the same month, Maulana Zaihid addressed the All Paksitan Khatam-i-Nabuwat conference in Lahore and demanded that the government demolish Ahmadiyya place of worship (Kaushik 64). As a direct result of heavy pressure by the fundamentalist groups, on April 26, 1984, two brand new sections were introduced in the Pakistani Penal code as part of the Martial Law Ordinance XX. These outlawed calling the Ahmadiyya place of worship a mosque and prohibited the Ahmadiyya community from the calling of prayer (Khan 227). Due to Intense pressure from the MTKN, the Punjabi government told the commissioner in Punjab to erase the kalima (testification of the Islamic faith) from the Ahmadiyya place of worship (Kaushik 69). In 1986, Ordinance XX was enhanced into what is also known as the “blasphemy law”, section 295-C of the Pakistani penal code was amended and the penalty against blasphemy was increased from a fine or imprisonment to death (Khan 228). Since the Ahmadi belief in Mirza Ghulam Ahmad was considered blasphemous, their mere existence as practicing Ahmadis could be considered correspondingly blasphemous and thereby punishable by death. After the implementation of this law, the Ahmadiyya community could not even acknowledge their faith in trepidation of indirectly or directly posing as a Muslim.