ISLAMABAD: Thirty-one people had been arrested after a Hindu temple was set on fire and demolished by a mob, Hafiz Muhammad Tahir Mehmood Ashrafi, special adviser to the prime minister on religious harmony, said on Thursday.
The temple’s destruction on Wednesday in the northwestern town of Karak drew condemnation from government officials, human rights activists and the minority Hindu community.
Local police told media they had detained dozens of people in overnight raids and searches were underway to arrest more people who had participated or provoked the mob to demolish the temple.
The attack happened after members of the Hindu community received permission from local authorities to renovate the temple. Witnesses told AP the mob was led by a local cleric and supporters of Pakistan’s Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam party. There has been no comment from the party so far.
“31 culprits including mastermind involved in attack at Hindu temple in Karak have been arrested,” Ashrafi said in a statement. “Elements involved in making attacks at worship places of minorities and threatening minorities will not be forgiven.”
“The Karak temple attack will be thoroughly probed as this instance maligned Pakistan in the world,” Ashrafi added.
Pakistan’s minister for religious affairs, Noorul Haq Qadri, called the attack on the temple “a conspiracy against sectarian harmony.” He took to Twitter Thursday, saying attacks on places of worship of minority religious groups are not allowed in Islam and “protection of religious freedom of minorities is our religious, constitutional, moral and national responsibility.”
Pakistan Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed also took notice of the incident and fixed a court hearing for January 5. 
The incident comes weeks after the government allowed Hindu residents to build a new temple in Islamabad on the recommendation of a council of clerics.
Although Muslims and Hindus generally live peacefully together in Pakistan, there have been other attacks on Hindu temples in recent years. Most of Pakistan’s minority Hindus migrated to India in 1947 when India was divided by Britain’s government.