Hundreds of protesters ran amok in Pakistan's Sindh province after the principal of a school, belonging to the minority Hindu community, was falsely accused of blasphemy and booked in the matter.
Demonstrations began in Ghotki town on Saturday after an FIR was filed against Notal Mal, the teacher of Sindh Public School, by Abdul Aziz Rajput, alleging that the principal had committed blasphemy, The Dawn reported.
Following this, protesters took to the streets and demanded the arrest of the principal and issued a call for a shutter-down strike.
Several videos of stick-wielding protesters had gone viral on social media on Sunday, in which they were seen desecrating a Hindu temple and damaging the school where the alleged incident occurred.
Police were controlling law and order situation in the area, said Ghotki Senior Superintendent of Police Farrukh Lanjar.
Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf's (PTI) Ramesh Kumar Vankw, who is also the head of the Pakistan Hindu Council, said that the matter will be investigated by Hyderabad Deputy Inspector General Naeem Shaikh.
Vankw also said that the principal was at an undisclosed location for security reasons and will be handed over to the police.
The incident has come at a time when Pakistan has been ranting up its diabolic rhetoric of the so-called mistreatment of minorities in India, particularly Muslims, ever since New Delhi decided to abrogate Article 370 that granted special status to Jammu and Kashmir.
Earlier this year, major protests led by religious parties erupted in various cities across Pakistan after the country's Supreme Court acquitted Christian woman Asiya Bibi in connection with a blasphemy case. Fearing for their lives, Bibi and her family have fled to Canada to escape persecution.
Pakistan has been repeatedly slammed by the international community for not taking stringent measures to protect its minority communities, despite the country's Prime Minister Imran Khan vowing to protect them on numerous occasions.
In Pakistan, religious persecution of minority communities, including Sikhs, Hindus, and Christians are regularly reported.
Recently, Baldev Kumar, a former MLA from Imran Khan's ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, said that minorities are not safe in Pakistan. Baldev is in India along with his family to seek political asylum.
( With inputs from ANI )