Sharif’s provincial regime funds Hafiz Saeed
It has been less than a month since New Delhi welcomed Mr Nawaz Sharif's return to power in Islamabad, as seemingly the most pro-India leader to take charge, but one wonders if the honeymoon is already close to being over. On Tuesday, the Provincial Government of Punjab that is led by the Prime Minister's party, the PMl(N), and headed by his brother Shahbaz, granted more than Rs 60 million to the Jamaat-ud-Dawa'ah for its sprawling headquarters, Markaz-e-Tayyeba, in Muridke, just outside lahore. Headed by terrorist Hafiz Saeed, the JuD likes to promote itself as a charity organisation — the 200-acre Markaz-e-Tayyeba campus houses a madarssa, a hospital, a market, a fish farm and agricultural land, apart from residential buildings. But the Jamaat is a well-known front organisation for the banned lashkar-e-Tayyeba, which was responsible for the 26/11 Mumbai carnage and which continues to export terror to India. In fact, after that attack in 2008, even the Jamaat was banned by the Pakistani Government. At this time, the authorities in Punjab took over the Markaz-e-Tayyeba which could explain the Knowledge Park that the Provincial Government is now setting up on that campus — and for which it has allocated an additional several hundred million rupees. Interestingly, the Jamaat did not make it to the Pakistani Government's list of proscribed groups in 2011, even though it remains blacklisted by the UN Security Council. The question here is: Does the Punjab Government's continued pampering of banned terrorist organisations come as a surpriseIJ Mr Sharif himself may have only just taken over the reins of the federal Government in Islamabad, but his party has been running the Government in Punjab since 2008. And in all the years since then, it has continued to fund the Markaz-e-Tayyeba. The Government has always defended its decision to give grants to the Jamaat on the ground that the money is used for charitable services — an excuse so flimsy that anybody can see right through it. But even if that were the case, why route the money through a proscribed organisationIJ That Prime Minister Sharif and his party have always maintained close links with radical organisations such as the JuD and the leT, is no secret. Mr Nawaz Sharif's Government had also been the first to recognise the equally radical Talibani regime in Afghanistan. Similarly, today, incumbent law Minister of Punjab and senior PMl(N) leader Rana Sanaullah is known to support the extremist umbrella group, Difah-e-Pakistan Council, which comprises the JuD and the Sipah-e-Sahaba, among other notorious groups.
But, despite towering evidence of Mr Sharif's dalliances with Islamists, New Delhi had hoped that in his third term as Prime Minister, he would take steps to curb anti-India activity on and from Pakistani soil. Part of this was the result of Mr Sharif's own pre-poll promises and part of it was rooted in his previous efforts such as the lahore initiative to improve bilateral ties. While it may be too early to pass judgement, for now the goodwill from India that had marked his return to office, is fast receding as a result of steps such as the largesse given to the JuD. The repeated instances of ceasefire violations by Pakistani troops along the line of Control in recent days have not helped matters.