Will you question Pakistan on border killings, Akali leader asks Sidhu

Shiromani Akali Dal leader Bikram Singh Majithia on Wednesday asked Punjab Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu to come clean on the Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara corridor in the wake of Pakistan's official stand on the issue.

Majithia told the media here that now that the Pakistan Foreign Ministry had maintained that no official communication had been sent to India for opening the Kartarpur gurdwara corridor, Sidhu should tell the public why he was allegedly asserting that "Pakistan was right and India wrong in not reciprocating a gesture that was never made".

"You must now come clean and tell why you became a mouthpiece for the Pakistan Army General and its Inter-Services Intelligence and gave an impression that Pakistan was ready to open the corridor but India was coming in the way."

He also asked Sidhu whether he will ask Pakistan Prime Minister and its Army chief why they were killing Indian soldiers on the border.

"Sidhu should also tell whether he in agreement with Pakistan even now, especially when barbarity was committed on an Indian soldier on Tuesday on the Line of Control. Can he face soldier Narinder Kumar's family and the Sikh community after the lies and deceit he has committed in the name of Guru Nanak Dev," he asked.

Majithia said that the Congress and its President Rahul Gandhi should also say whether they supported the "cheap manner" in which Sidhu allegedly lied and misled the Sikh community by claiming that Pakistan will open the Kartarpur corridor when he was flayed for hugging Pakistan Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa in Islamabad on August 18.

With Union Exernal Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj also making it official that there was no formal communication from Pakistan to India on the corridor, Sidhu had nowhere to run, the former Minister said.

He said that as far as his party and Sikh institutions were concerned, they will continue to make efforts to get the corridor opened.

--IANS

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