Move to rename science centre

ISLAMABAD:Pakistan’s Parliament has unanimously passed a resolution seeking to rename the Abdus Salam Centre for Physics at a leading university after a 12th century Byzantine-era astronomer, largely because of Salam’s Ahmadi faith.

The centre at the Quaid-eAzam University in Islamabad was named after Salam, the first Pakistani Nobel laureate, in 2016 after the move was approved by then prime minister Nawaz Sharif. The resolution passed by the National Assembly or lower house of Parliament on Thursday was tabled by Muhammad Safdar, the son-in-law of Sharif. It called for the Abdus Salam Centre for Physics to be renamed as the Abu al-Fath Abdul Rahman Al-Khazini Centre. The resolution Al-Khazini as a famous scientist who was the “biggest name for Muslims in physics”.

In December 2016, Sharif approved the naming of the National Centre for Physics at Quaid-e-Azam University after Salam, the renowned physicist who won a Nobel Prize in physics in 1979. The decision was made in view of the achievements of Salam, who also played a guiding role in the early stages of Pakistan nuclear weapons programme. Soon after the move, Safdar started a campaign for the renaming of the centre because Salam belonged to the Ahmadi minority, which was declared non-Muslim by the Parliament in 1974. Safdar insisted the centre be named after a Muslim scholar.

Salam left Pakistan in 1974 to protest the Ahmadis being declared non-Muslims.