J&K Updates

Amritsar: A Hindu activist from Jammu and Kashmir is looking to the Kartarpur corridor in Punjab for inspiration to get similar access to the ancient Sharda Peeth shrine in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
Save Sharda Committee Kashmir (SSCK) founder president Ravinder Pandita visited Gurdwara Darbar Sahib, Kartarpur Sahib, via the corridor on Monday. “I had gone there to pay obeisance and see how the Kartarpur corridor model works, how it helps promote people-to-people contact, and how the same can be replicated for Sharda Peeth,” he said, on his return to India.
The Kartarpur corridor was thrown open to Sikh pilgrims from India on November 9, so that they could pay obeisance on the land where Guru Nanak Dev spent his last years. As Kartarpur is just 4.5km from the Indo-Pak border, two roads were constructed on either side of the border and Sikhs allowed access to the shrine through the corridor.
Similarly, Sharda Peeth is 10km inside PoK from the LoC. There have already been demands for opening a corridor to it and Pakistan is said to have given a go-ahead to one such proposal in March this year. Pandita said both Indian and Pakistani governments spent a huge sum on the corridor on both sides of the international border. “But there is no need to construct any huge infrastructure in Jammu and Kashmir for opening the Sharda Peeth corridor,” he said.
He added that there already existed two bus services from Poonch to Rawalakot, PoK, and Srinagar to Muzaffarabad, PoK. “Both India and Pakistan governments have to only make amendments in rules on cross-LoC permits, allowing Hindus to undertake pilgrimage to Sharda Peeth,” said Pandita.
The cross LoC permits are issued to Jammu and Kashmir residents who have families across the LoC for meeting them or for business.
Pandit said they had also given a memorandum to the president of Pakistan Sikh Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee (PSGPC) to seek its support for the cause.

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