BATHINDA: The escalating tension between India-Pakistan notwithstanding, some organizations in both countries are still praying for peace and have not stopped their efforts. Undeterred by the happenings in the recent past of uninterrupted exchange of firing on the LoC in J&K, leading to killing of soldiers, Pakistan-based
Bhagat Singh Memorial Foundation and joint forum of India-Pakistan Aaghaz-e-Dosti held programmes in the last few days for peace between the two neighbours. Bhagat Singh foundation members even demanded liberalizing the visa policy for residents of both countries.
Aaghaz-e-Dosti, which is facing trouble due to disappearance of its Pakistan chapter convener and peace activist Raza Khan on December 2, 2017, in Pakistan, continued with its peace-building measures and launched the sixth India-Pakistan peace calendar on January 13 in New Delhi. The forum members said it was meant to foster people-to-people relations between people of both countries. The calendar is a collection of paintings prepared by school students from India and Pakistan based on peace, which carries messages from eminent personalities of both sides wanting peace in the subcontinent.
Aaghaz-e-Dosti India convener Devika Mittal said, "We aim to create unwavering bonds of peace and friendship between India and Pakistan. We seek to become the medium to discover and recognize the misrepresented reality on either side of the border." Another activist
Ravi Nitesh said they were organizing peace sessions among students under classroom connect and exchange of letters. He said, "Recently letters written by Indian students were exhibited at the house of eminent Pakistani poet
Faiz Ahmed Faiz in Lahore."
Bhagat Singh foundation held a demonstration in Lahore last week to make efforts for peace by de-escalating tension between India and Pakistan. Foundation chairman Imtiaz Rashid Qureshi told
TOI over phone from Lahore that militarized tension could never be in the interests of the citizens of both nations. "Only peace could ensure development in both countries and for that we held a demonstration and urged the regime to explore the channel of negotiations and ensure hassle-free visa regime," he said.
"Many Hindus living in Pakistan are waiting for the visas for months to meet relatives while a few are waiting to immerse the mortal remains of the dead relatives in the Ganges. We urge both countries to at least think for residents of both counties," he said.
'Install statue of Bhagat Singh'
Amritsar: Ahead of the martyrdom anniversary of Bhagat Singh, Rajguru and Sukdev, the Bhagat Singh Memorial Foundation, Pakistan, has demanded from the
Punjab government to not only name the Shadman Chowk after the revolutionary but also install his statue there. Talking to TOI on Wednesday, chairman of the foundation Imtiaz Rashid Qureshi said that the founder of Pakistan Qaid-e-Azam
Mohammad Ali Jinnah on September 4 and 12, 1929, had paid tributes by saying that, "There have never been born any such brave person in the subcontinent like Bhagat Singh."
