White trail: a journey into the heart of Pakistan's religious minorities

The formation of Pakistan and the search for an Islamic identity are inextricably interlinked, says journalist Haroon Khalid of the wider issue of global politics, he reasons, the rise of Islamic fundamentalism has been a side effect. And religious intolerance places the minority communities of the country in a precarious position. They have to come to terms with a rapidly changing situation. A White Trail is an ethnographic study of these communities and the changes they have to face. At a time when almost all accounts of religious minorities in the country focus on the persecution and discrimination they experience, A white trail delves deeper into their lives, using the occasion of religious festivals to gain a deeper insight into the psyche of Pakistani Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Zoroastrians and Bahais. It seeks to understand, through the oral testimonies of the members of these communities, larger socio-political issues arising from the situation. A White Trail originally began as a series of newspaper articles written by Lahore-based Haroon Khalid for Pakistan's widely circulated weekly, The Friday times.