–Party vows to impart religious teachings to military officials, abolish co-education system if comes to power

LAHORE: Tehreek-e-Labbaik Ya Rasool Allah (TLYR) led by Allama Khadim Hussain Rizvi on Tuesday unveiled its 20-point election manifesto with an ambition to contest the upcoming general elections scheduled for July 25.

TLYR would participate in the elections from the platform of Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) – a political party that got itself registered with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) ahead of the NA-120 by-polls last year.

While revealing the election manifesto of his party, Khadim Rizvi said that that they were unable to decide the candidates for national and provincial assemblies yet as more than a dozen aspirants had submitted their applications from each constituency demanding tickets and the party, for now, was analysing their credentials before announcing the final list of candidates.

Speaking about the possibility of an alliance of his party with any other religio-political parties of the Barelvi school of thought, Rizvi said that they had announced their manifesto and any other political or religious party agreeing to it would be welcomed.

Sharing the salient features of TLP’s election manifesto, the patron-in-chief of the party, Pir Afzal Qadri said that it was based on 20 points and no other political or religious party had a manifesto that was crafted while keeping in view the ideology of Pakistan.

“The intervention of internal and external anti-Islamic forces in our politics, education, economy and society would be eliminated. Likeminded Islamic countries would be organised in order to make an Islamic bloc for the security of Muslim Ummah,” said the patron-in-chief of the party.

The manifesto further includes the formation of a new ministry named “Amar Bil Maaroof o Nahi Anil Munkir” [Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice] that would work for the promotion of Islam and for guarding the sanctity of the Holy Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him). The same ministry would also work against vulgarity and obscenity while banning the co-education system.

The manifesto further says that an interest-free economy would be maintained and the entire nation, as well as all commercial banks, would be engaged in trading to help the country prosper. “The military and civil officials would be imparted basic teachings of religion while the foreign policy would be reshaped in line with the teachings of Islam,” the manifesto says.

“Our competition in the elections would be with those who tried to abolish the clause of the finality of prophethood and those who promote dancing girls in their public meetings,” firebrand and controversial religious scholar Khadim Rizvi said while criticising Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

Meanwhile, TLP announced the candidates it would be fielding to contest the general polls from the twin cities. According to its Divisional Media Coordinator Moulana Muhammad Abdul Latif Qadri, Chaudhary Rizwan Ahmad Saifi from Islamabad’s NA-52, Ghazi Afnan Baloch from NA-53, Malik Sajid Awan from NA-54, Dr Syed Muhammad Naeem from NA-55 Attock, Syed Faisal Gillani from NA-56, Syed Tassaduq Manzoor Shah from NA-64, Pir Major Yaqoob Saifi from NA-65, Muhammad Tanvir from NA-66, Syed Nauman Shah NA-67, and others have submitted the nomination papers.

It merits mention that TLP appeared in the political horizon prior to the by-polls of NA-120 where the party stood third despite the fact that it was its first political test.