Vice-President M Venkaiah Naidu and former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh on Wednesday hailed the opening of Kartarpur corridor, while calling upon the people to follow the path shown by the first Sikh master Guru Nanak Dev.
The corridor, set up official inaugurate on November 9 on Indian side, and a day before on the Pakistan side, will connect Darbar Sahib in Pakistan’s Kartarpur — the final resting place of Guru Nanak Dev — with Dera Baba Nanak shrine in Gurdaspur district in Punjab.
Participating in the one-of-its-kind commemorative Vidhan Sabha session on Wednesday to mark the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak Dev, the Vice-President expressed happiness over setting up of the Kartarpur corridor.
“I am sure it would be a corridor to the shrine of peace, harmony, and humanism, to the universal vision of a world as one family, o the sublime ideal of service to humanity,” he said while addressing the special Vidhan Sabha session attended by members of both Punjab and Haryana legislative assemblies besides the Governors.
Senior Congress leader Dr Manmohan Singh also expressed hope that the “Kartarpur model” might help in resolving future conflicts. “Peace and harmony is the only way forward to ensure a prosperous future. I hope the Kartarpur Model would be replicated in future too for lasting resolution of conflicts,” he said.
Describing Guru Nanak Dev as one of “India’s most democratic spiritual leaders”, the Vice President said that a new world of peace and sustainable development can be found if teachings of the first Sikh Guru are integrated in daily lives.
“The Guru’s vision was timeless and has as much relevance today as it was when it was expounded five centuries ago,” he said.”
Naidu, who started his address in Punjabi, said that he was happy to attend the special session and also praised Punjab Assembly Speaker Rana KP Singh and Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh for taking an initiative to organise the event, and even inviting their Haryana counterparts to be a part of the memorable session hoping that this initiative would go a long way in spreading the message and teachings of Guru Nanak Dev ji far and wide.
Besides Punjab MLAs and MPs, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, Haryana Governor Satyadev Narayan Arya, Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala, Leader of Opposition of Haryana Vidhan Sabha Bhupinder Singh Hooda, and legislatures of Haryana also attended the special event.
It is for the first time after the carving of Haryana out of Punjab in 1966 that MLAs of both Punjab and Haryana sat together in the Punjab Assembly for a special commemorative session.
“It is quite appropriate that this temple of democracy is dedicating a special session to one of India’s most democratic spiritual leaders,” said Naidu adding that Guru Nanak ji belong to the long illustrious tradition of India’s visionary spiritual leaders who have illumined human existence and greatly enriched the country’s cultural capital.
“Guru Nanakji saw what ordinary people could not. They enrich people’s lives through their insights and ideas. In fact, that is the meaning of the word ‘Guru’. Guru is one who provides illumination, dispels doubts and shows the path...For the first Sikh Guru, the differences and multiple identities based on caste, creed, religion and language were irrelevant,” he said.
He said that our world view has been continually broadened by timeless messages of enlightened pathfinders like Guru Nanakji. “We, as democratic political leaders, and even as common citizens, have so much to learn from teachings of this great personality...If we can internalise and integrate these messages in our daily lives and reshape our thinking and actions, we can certainly discover a new world of peace and sustainable development,” he added.
Naidu stated that respect for women and gender equality was another important lesson to be learnt from Guru Nanak Dev’s life. “This spirit of equality began with Guru Nanak Dev’s clear recognition that there is no distinction between a Hindu and ‘Mussalman’. For him, no country was foreign and no people were alien,” he said.
Maintaining that it was worth noting that Guru Nanak initiated inter-faith dialogue way back in the 16th century AD and had conversations with most of the religious denominations of his times, Naidu said that the world needs such spiritual leaders, who can engage in a meaningful dialogue to exchange ideas in order to promote peace, stability and cooperation.
Naidu also said that Guru Nanak Dev insisted that one should earn one’s living by hard work. “Work, worship and share (kirat karo, naam japo, and wand chhako) was the motto he placed before his disciples. Earn by honest labour and share the earnings with the needy,” he said while calling upon the MLAs to set an example as to how they can serve the people according to principles enunciated by Guru Nanak Dev.