Days after Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh dubbed opening of Kartarpur corridor as “ISI’s game plan”, his predecessor and Akali patriarch Parkash Singh Badal on Tuesday advised the Congress leader to refrain from doing or saying anything “that may sabotage this achievement”.
“Capt Amarinder should refrain from doing or saying anything that might become a pretext for blocking the Kartarpur Sahib corridor and sabotage the fulfilment of the aspirations and prayers (ardas) of crores of Sikhs all over the world for the past 70 years,” he said.
Badal said that the Government of India’s initiative and the Pakistan Government’s response to it are “a collective achievement of the entire khalsa panth (Sikh community), beyond individual or party lines, and this must be welcomed as such and no one should do or say anything that may sabotage this achievement”.
“The former chief minister said that Capt Amarinder’s recent statements on Kartarpur Sahib corridor were “extremely ill-advised and ill-timed. His utterances run contrary to the Sikh sentiments. I request him not to sabotage this sacred goal of the community”.
“The Chief Minister needs to be reminded that the opening of the corridor is not a political but a deeply religious aspiration of the khalsa panth for which every Sikh all across the globe has been praying every day over the past 70 years,” he said. Badal described it as the culmination of their daily ardas and of the long struggle which started with Master Tara Singh and in which some of the tallest Sikh leaders from Sant Fateh Singh, Sant Harchand Singh Longowal, Jathedar Gurcharan Singh Tohra, Jagdev Singh Talwandi, Kuldip Singh Wadala right up to the present leadership of the SAD and the entire Sikh community have contributed in a big way.
He said that everyone who has played a role in the achievement of this goal needs to be complimented,regardless of which party he belongs to.
Referring to the fears expressed by Capt Amarinder about possibility of corridor being misused by the Pakistan army and the ISI for fomenting trouble in India, especially in Punjab, Badal said: “Captain Sahib is forgetting that the Punjabis in general and the Sikhs in particular are a fiercely patriotic people and are fully capable of dealing with any challenge thrown at the security, the unity and the integrity of the country.”
“Captain Sahib, as an ex-member of the Indian army, should also know that our forces are more than a match for any evil designs against the country”.
Punjab Chief Minister should leave the issue of assessing and dealing with security concerns to the Government of India, and should, as Chief Minister of Punjab, limit himself to supporting the initiative taken by India and responded to by Pakistan for opening the corridor,” he said.