LAHORE - PML-N Secretary Information and Senator Mushahidullah Khan said Sunday that Pakistani delegation had made clear to the Indian government that Kashmir was not their ‘atoot aung’ (integral part) and that New Delhi will have to show maturity and seriousness to resolve the outstanding issues.
He was talking to reporters on his arrival at Wagah border along with other members of the parliamentary delegation which visited India last week.
Mushahid said people in Pakistan wanted peace with India, and that is why no political party in Pakistan unlike India used anti-India slogan to secure victory in the last general elections.
To a question, he said parliamentarians of India and Pakistan were unanimous on the point that dialogue process between the two countries should continue. He said members of Pakistan delegation during their interaction with their Indian counterparts did not accept the ‘atoot aung’ mantra of the Indian government and maintained that peace would remain a dream until the two countries resolve their conflicts through negotiations.
Speaking on the occasion, Awais Leghari said India must realise that peace in the region was not only vital for Pakistan but for all countries in the region including India as well. He accused Indian media of maintaining partiality in its reporting on Pakistan-India relations.
“Indian media does not want to see peace in the region,” he said, adding that Pakistani media was 10 times more matured compared with India’s.
It may be recalled that delegation of Pakistani parliamentarian on an unofficial visit to India was severely neglected at Indian Lok Sabha last week.
Delegation comprising Senator Mushahidullah Khan, Maiza Hameed Gujjar, Awais Leghari and MQM’s Rashid Godil was in India on an unofficial visit where their visit to the Lok Sabha was arranged by Congress leader Mani Shankar Ayer.
Rashid Godil and Maiza Hameed had told an Indian channel that they were not allowed entry to view the proceedings of the Lok Sabha session because Speaker’s security staff didn’t let them in as they kept sitting in guest’s gallery the next day and were neither welcomed nor was it announced that Pakistani parliamentarians were present at the assembly. They had tried to meet Speaker Sumitra Mahajan but in vain whereas the speaker had maintained that she kept waiting at her chambers but nobody showed up.
Member assembly Kirti Azad of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), responsible for receiving Pakistani delegation, had taken the plea that the meeting time was 1 pm but he reached 7 minutes late so was unable to meet.
Also, Union Minister M Venkaiah Naidu reacted sharply to the remark of Pakistan MP against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, saying he had no moral right to criticise India or its PM as his country had been abetting terrorism and sheltering terrorists.
Awais Leghari, who headed the parliamentarian delegation to a Track 2 dialogue process, had suggested that Modi must show "statesmanship" to resolve the issues between the two countries. He had also claimed India did not "properly reciprocate" the gesture shown by Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif by attending the swearing-in ceremony of Modi.
Dismissing Leghari's remarks, Naidu had sought to know the meaning of talks ‘when they do not stop terrorists’ from continuing attacks and ‘killing innocents’ in the sub-continent. He had also accused Pakistan of making attempts to thwart the poll process by intensifying cross-border terror attacks in J&K.