Kartarpur corridor

Every year, an estimated 3,000 pilgrims from India and the Sikh diaspora around the world visit Pakistan to mark the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak – the founder of Sikhism. Despite the ever-present tensions between Pakistan and India, they safely travel to Guru Nanak’s birthplace of Nankana Sahib, his burial site in Narowal and their temples in Lahore and Hasanabdal. Pakistan has been making a real effort to accommodate the pilgrims – who are joined by Pakistan’s own population of 20,000 Sikhs – in recent years by restoring historic gurdwaras. Last year, however, India, which has become increasingly hostile under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accused Pakistan of failing to provide pilgrimage trains for the Sikhs, and even stopped 300 pilgrims from making the journey, ostensibly for security reasons. The story is different this year. When former cricketer and minister in the Indian Punjab government Navjot Singh Sidhu visited Pakistan for Prime Minister Imran Khan’s inauguration, Army Chief Qamar Javed Bajwa suggested building a corridor for Sikh pilgrims. That offer was officially conveyed to the Indian government this week and – perhaps surprisingly – it has been accepted. The Kartarpur corridor will be inaugurated by PM Imran Khan on November 28 and should stand as a symbol of the opportunities that still exist for peace even when a government as hostile as Modi’s is in power.

Before Modi had come into power, there seemed to be a drive towards more person-to-person contact. Track II diplomacy was on course and both countries had made it slightly easier for tourists to obtain visas. All that changed with the election of the ethnonationalist BJP, despite attempts by then prime minister Nawaz Sharif to keep the peace process on track. To his credit, Imran too has persevered and the opening of the Kartarpur corridor stands testament to Pakistan’s desire for peace. However, one shouldn’t get too hopeful by this development since India is unlikely to normalise relations or rethink its brutal occupation of Kashmir. But making it easier for pilgrims to visit Pakistan for the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak is positive in itself and does not necessarily have to be seen only through the prism of Pakistan-India relations. Our own track record on the treatment of minority groups has been far from praise-worthy while the Modi government’s extremism has now reached the extent that it is renaming Indian cities that have Muslim names. Anything that can help those who have been historically suppressed is to be lauded on its own terms.