New Delhi: Pakistan on Tuesday issued a whopping 3,800 visas to Indian Sikh pilgrims to participate in the celebrations to mark the 549th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, the first Guru of the Sikhs and the founder of Sikh-ism. Pakistan high commissioner Sohail Mahmood hailed the move as a “special gesture” by the Pakistan government.
While the move is bound to be welcomed by New Delhi, Indian security agencies have been concerned by attempts by notorious Pakistani spy agency ISI to try to radicalise Indian Sikh pilgrims visiting Pakistan to resurrect the terrorist Khalistan movement that wreaked havoc in India’s Punjab province in the 1980s and early 1990s.
The terrorist movement was smashed by the Punjab police way back in 1994.
But the recent grenade attack in Amritsar is being viewed in India as a fresh attempt by the ISI to stoke terror in Punjab.
Pakistani agencies have also been preventing the Indian high commissioner in Pakistan from visiting Sikh gurdwaras.
