The Tribune (13/04/2008)
by Harihar Swarup

In Pakistan human rights activist Ansar Burney is known as “Angel of God”. In India, too, he is considered an “Angel of Humanity”. On a visit last week to Punjab and, later, New Delhi, he was given a hero’s welcome.

Scenes of his meeting Kashmir Singh, who is now a free man because of him, and, later, family members of Sarabjit Singh, now on the death row in Pakistan, were moving indeed.

His efforts have raised a ray of hope for Sarabjit Singh, once considered a lost case. Burney has been quoted as saying he would seek pardon from the relatives of those killed in the Lahore blast 18 years ago in which Sarabjit was allegedly involved.

Burney’s meetings with Home Minister Shivraj Patil and Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon were rewarding as India agreed to release unilaterally Pakistan nationals lodged in Indian prisons. In return, he would try to persuade Islamabad to reciprocate the gesture.

Karachi-born, 52-year-old Burney grew up in a country where military coups led to a system of martial law culture that sustained a culture of human rights degradation and imprisonment of countless innocent, men, women and children.

He was himself imprisonment thrice for carrying on a crusade against human rights violations. During his first eight-month imprisonment, he experienced first hand the injustice perpetrated by a faulty legal system.

He also met people who, like him, were wrongly put behind bars and saw shocking conditions in Pakistani jails. Burney’s will to fight human rights violations became more firm during his second and third terms in prison.

On his release, Burney founded the Ansar Burney Welfare Trust and the Prison Aid Society, dedicated to reforming Pakistani prisons and release of innocent and illegally detained persons.

Since its foundation in 1980, the Trust has been instrumental in the release of over 700,000 men, women and children across the world.

Burney’s efforts to bring to light the plight of thousands of South Asian and African children trafficked to Arabian Gulf countries for exploitation as camel jockeys drew the world’s attention.

As a result of his efforts, the government of the UAE established its first-ever shelter for rescued child camel jockeys and rescued 68 such children and repatriated 43 of them.

In 2005, the US state department recognised Burney’s efforts and declared him an international hero.

The story of child jockeys has been blood curdling. These children, living in wretched conditions, were abused and tortured. They lived and slept in hot, crowded huts made from corrugated iron sheets without electricity in high desert temperatures.

Some of them as young as two years were purposely malnourished (to keep them lightweight) and denied education.

The plight of these hapless children was brought to the attention of the western world by a documentary that was aired on HBO as part of the network’s Real Sports series. Burney says “the film was enough to shake the conscience of the entire world”.

A holder of master’s and law degrees from Karachi University, Burney was the first person to receive Pakistan’s national civil award, Sitara-i-Imtiaz, in the field of human rights.

He also headed briefly the newly established Human Rights Ministry of Pakistan. His area of operation does not confine to Pakistan but his activities have become global.

Besides child slavery and long-serving prisoners, he has also taken up the cause of exploited women. Some of them were sentenced to death by public stoning for no fault of theirs.

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