Earlier today, Nimra Amjad, a Pakistani woman currently residing in Canada, shared a heartwarming post regarding a childhood Ahmedi friend who recently confided in her about his true identity. According to Nimra, they have been friends for the past 20 years and he never revealed his true identity because he feared he would be disowned by his friends. This news came as a shock for Nimra too and she just had to let it out. And so she did, in a heart-breakingly beautiful Facebook post.

Nimra Amjad is an environmental scientist and human rights activist who grew up in Pakistan. She now lives in Canada where she is involved in politics and policy research. She is the founder of Pakistan Sustainability Network and the Justinian Project.

“I want to share a story. I’ve gotten a lot of messages about my comments about Ahmedis / Mahershala Ali’s Oscar win. No, I am not Ahmedi by birth or by choice. My parents are Sunni. I was only pointing to the philosophical inconsistency of celebrating Ali’s Oscar win as “one for the Muslims” by people who support state laws that declare Ahmedis as “non-Muslims,” says Nimra in her Facebook post.

Nimra hated this guy in the beginning but one day, he found her in the library and they began talking. This was the beginning of a life-long friendship between the two.

“Because of him, I developed a love of theatre and we even wrote and performed plays together at school. Then came dance competitions and debates and science fairs. Anything we did together, we excelled at. He coached me for Math and Science. I helped him with English and History. My grades improved and I transformed into a confident public speaker. There was nothing we couldn’t tell each other and we were so close our parents became friends too and we spent weekends at each others’ houses. He is the kind of ally I wish every little girl gets when she is growing up. He is family. His family is family,” writes Nimra.

“Fast-forward to a few years later. We are in our early 20s and catching up on the phone after a long time. He was talking about the challenges he was facing at medical school. I teased him about never getting anything lower than an A- in his entire life. Then came the moment of truth. “You see, Nimra, I am Ahmedi”, he said, bracing for my reaction. There was silence on the line. All these years I did not know! My parents did not know. None of our friends from school knew. He was afraid that he would lose his friends if he told them. Imagine for one second what a child has to feel to keep his identity secret for fear of hate throughout his life. I couldn’t. He was going to University in a part of Pakistan that had elected a right wing religious political party… some youth groups associated with this party had discovered he was Ahmedi and cornered him at University. He received death threats and was beaten up. The revelation came crashing down on me like a ton of bricks and I broke down crying. My dear friend, who had always been there for me, who always had my back and encouraged me to reach for the stars had suffered all this time and I had no idea. I was not there for him. I couldn’t help him. I failed to protect him from the dehumanization that comes from being an Ahmedi in Pakistan,”revealed Nimra.

Nimra further mentions about how we have, throughout history, excluded and marginalized Ahmedia just because their beliefs aren’t consistent with ours.

While talking to Mangobaaz, Nimra said, “I want them (Pakistanis) to know that Pakistan is the only Muslim state to have these type of laws and that we should ask ourselves if it is the job of a government to stop some citizens from reading the Quran, saying their names and saying “salams” to others.”

As Nimra said and I quote, “faith is between people and whatever deity they believe in or do not believe in. The State of Pakistan cannot play God. Speak out. The next time someone in your family or a friend says something dehumanizing about Ahmedis, say something. It is the least you can do.”

Here’s the original post:

What’re your thoughts?

Cover Image Via: Nimra Amjad