SGPC decries Pak govt for barring Indian envoy from entering gurdwara

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, June 23

The SGPC has decried the Pakistan government’s move to deny the staff of Indian High Commission, led by its High Commissioner to Pakistan Ajay Bisaria, entry into Gurdwara Panja Sahib.

SGPC chief Gobind Singh Longowal said, “The Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan has a right to visit his countrymen who are visiting historic Sikh shrines there to commemorate the death anniversary of Maharaja Ranjit Singh.”

“It is a matter of grief that the same thing was done by the Pakistan government when the Sikh jatha from India had gone to Pakistan to celebrate the Khalsa Sirjana Diwas two months ago,” he added.

Meanwhile, India on Saturday summoned Pakistan’s Deputy High Commissioner Syed Haider Shah in New Delhi and lodged a protest over the incident.

They were denied entry despite having travel permission from the Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said in a statement.

Meanwhile, SGPC additional secretary Daljit Singh Bedi said no woman below the age 50 would be allowed to visit Pakistan alone. They could be allowed only after getting undertaking of their family members, he said.

In April, a woman from Punjab, Kiran Bala, who had gone to attend Baisakhi festival, married a Pakistani man in Lahore and embraced Islam.