Pak fishes in Sikh waters

New Delhi itself is upset about the visit which seems to have contravened by established protocol. The pilgrims were given Pakistani visas without the required official endorsement from the Government although an Indo-Pak agreement on religious visits stipulates that any jatha going to a gurdwara in Pakistan must be sponsored by the Government and accompanied by officials from New Delhi and Punjab.

The Government stopped sponsoring jathas after the SGPC imposed a ban on pilgrimage to Pakistan in protest against the creation of a rival Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee in Lahore in late 1998. The SGPC was particularly incensed by the appointment of former ISI chief Javed Nasir as the PGPC president.

Against this backdrop, Pakistan’s decision to allow an unofficial jatha

to visit Lahore has raised suspicions of a larger gameplan to open up another front in its proxy war against New Delhi by stoking trouble in Punjab. While the authorities here discount the possibility of a return to militancy in Akali-ruled Punjab, they are worried about the impact on Sikh politics of Islamabad’s moves on the gurdwaras on its side of the border.

Their worries have been heightened by the role of proponents of Khalistan like Washington-based Ganga Singh Dhillon and London-based Jagjit Singh Chauhan. According to Badal’s point man in Delhi, Avtar Singh Hit, who is also the newly elected president of the Delhi Sikh Gurudwara Management Committee, Dhillon telephoned the SGPC Secretary last month to ask for the removal of the ban on jathas going to Pakistan.

Hit said Dhillon promised to make all the arrangements for pilgrims as an associate of the recently formed Pakistan Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee. While the SGPC refused to have anything to do with him, Dhillon managed to persuade the rival faction to send pilgrims which is how the 140-strong batch went in early June, Hit stated.

"They were received by Dhillon with all the honours," Hit said. "It’s obvious that Pakistan is trying to divide the Sikhs with the help of people like Dhillon. I’ve written several letters to the PM as well as the Home Minister asking them to intervene. Why isn’t the Government doing something about it?"

The SGPC too is mounting pressure. It sent a written complaint to External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh about the suspected destruction of the Chowbachchasahib Gurdwara in Lahore. The letter demanded that the Government take up the matter officially with Islamabad and move to get the SGPC associated with all gurudwara properties in Pakistan.

In fact, the creation of the PGPC was an issue Vajpayee took up with deposed premier Nawaz Sharif on that fateful trip to Lahore last year. Badal too lodged a protest with his counterpart in Pakistan Punjab. And since then, Badal has been putting pressure on New Delhi regularly to make a formal diplomatic representation to Islamabad. The issue figures in every meeting he has with Vajpayee and Advani. He has also written to them several times.

As Tarlochan Singh, member of the Minority Commission, explained, "The SGPC in Amritsar is the supreme body of the Sikh religion. No one should undermine its authority otherwise the Sikh cause will be weakened."