M A I N   N E W S

India’s plain talk on Pak gurdwaras
Rajeev Sharma
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, December 23
Exhibiting diplomatic pro-activism, India today did some plain talk with Pakistan’s Deputy High Commissioner here and highlighted the pathetic condition of the Pakistan Shiromani Gurdwara Prabhandhak Committee-run gurdwaras and reports of widespread corruption in the PSGPC.

It was a rare occasion in past one year when the Pakistani envoy, Mr Jalil Abbas Jilani, was requested to attend a meeting in the Foreign Office here and the Ministry of External Affairs took care not to dub it as “summoning”.

However, Mr Arun Singh, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs and in charge of Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Iran (PAI) desk, did not mince words when he told Mr Jilani that the Sikh jatha that had visited Pakistan last month on the occasion of Guru Nanak Dev’s anniversary had found that the gurdwaras there were in a decrepit condition.

‘The Tribune’ reporter Varinder Walia, who had accompanied the jatha to Pakistan, had filed several reports highlighting the PSGPC’s sheer neglect in maintaining the gurdwaras. It is understood that the MEA relied heavily on ‘The Tribune’ reports.

A spate of stories have appeared in the Pakistani press also in the recent past exposing rampant corruption in PSGPC. A former chief of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Lt Gen Javed Nasir, who was made PSGPC chief, was accused of misappropriating PSGPC funds worth more than Rs 100 crore.

His successor Inayatullah Khan Niyazi was removed on August 27 this year after corruption charges started flying against him in managing the PSGPC. Among the charges levelled against him are swindling 12 kg of gold and misappropriating donations from the Sikhs abroad to the PSGPC to the tune of Rs 1.65 crore.

Today’s meeting of Mr Jilani and Mr Arun Singh comes in the wake of reports that Pakistan is plotting to revive militancy in Punjab in a big way.