Nawaz Sharif to attend Modi's swearing-in

Sri Lankan President Rajapaksa, Afghanistan president Karzai among other leaders who will attend the ceremony

Pakistan today confirmed that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will attend Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi's swearing-in ceremony on Monday at the sprawling Rashtrapati Bhavan. 

 

"PM Mohammad Nawaz Sharif will attend oath taking ceremony of India's PM elect," said a statement issued by the Pakistan High Commission here today. 

 

This will be the Pakistan PM's first ever visit to India since assuming office in May last year. His attendance will be historical because never before has any Pakistan PM attended the swearing-in ceremony of any Indian PM. 

 

After winning a landslide victory on May 16, all the leaders of the eight-nation South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC) were invited to take part in the oath-taking ceremony of Narendra Modi. 

 

The move has been widely seen as a smart diplomatic move by the incoming Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, signaling the fact that integration of South Asia will form a significant part of Modi's foreign policy. 

 

The Ministry of External Affairs earlier confirmed that post the swearing-in ceremony, on Tuesday, Modi will hold individual meetings with some of the SAARC leaders. However, it was not confirmed whether Sharif will hold separate talks with Modi. The Congress has said the atmosphere was not conducive for talks and Prime Minister-designate Narendra Modi's invitation to his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif to attend his swearing-in ceremony would merely provide a photo opportunity.

 

"Modi has invited heads of state from the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation. It is nice to have good relations with our neighbours, but there is no precedence of any foreign dignitary being present at the swearing-in (of an Indian prime minister)," Congress spokesperson Shakeel Ahmed said on Friday. 

 

Similar to BJP's thumping victory this month decimating the Congress Party, Nawaz Sharif's party Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) had won an overwhelming majority in the National Assembly in Punjab with 116 seats, while taking only eight in other provinces. The former ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP), which secured 88 directly elected seats in 2008 from all four provinces, was reduced to a regional party, securing 29 direct seats in Sindh and only two seats in Punjab. 

 

Besides Sharif, other leaders who will be attending the event are Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, Maldives President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom, Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa, Bhutan PM Tshering Tobgay, Mauritius PM Navinchandra Ramgoolam, Nepal PM Sushil Koirala and Bangladesh speaker Shirin Shamin Chaudhury.