For 50 Pakistani students, a ticket to India

“There were many security concerns back then, so we didn’t want to risk anything. These are students we are talking about, aged between 10 and 14. We want to bring peace and harmony into the world but not at the cost of the security of the children. So we scrapped the visit then. At this point, security concerns are at bay, which is why we are going ahead with the visit,” said Rakesh Gupta, founder of the NGO. He said his team had applied for the visas a month ago, and had no idea that something of this sort would take place yet again. “It’s so hard to strike a balancing act, of convincing the parents in Pakistan to send their children, for us to facilitate it with both India and Pakistan… And make sure that children are untouched by the hostility,” said Gupta who, along with a group of Indian students, had visited Pakistan as part of the same programme after the Peshawar massacre in 2014.

The students will be taken for a sightseeing trip of Delhi, followed by a visit to the schools on Tuesday, and to Agra on Wednesday. They will be hosted at the Pakistani Embassy on May 4. “The attack on the two Indian soldiers pains me as an Indian. But these are children, and India will take care of them like their own,” said Gupta.