Imran Khan to lay foundation stone for Kartarpur corridor in Pakistan

Pic Courtesy: PTI

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan will lay the foundation stone of Kartarpur corridor on Wednesday. The corridor will link Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur, the final resting place of Sikh faith's founder Guru Nanak, and the international border with India, facilitating Sikh pilgrims across the border.

Pakistan Minister of Information Fawad Choudhary and Pakistani Army chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa are expected to attend the foundation stone laying ceremony. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj was also invited for the event by Pakistan. However, she expressed her inability to attend the same.

The government of India is sending Union ministers Harsimrat Kaur Badal and HS Puri for the ceremony. Besides, Punjab minister and Congress leader Navjot Singh Sidhu will also attend the event.

Sidhu reached Lahore on Tuesday itself. Soon after his arrival in Pakistan, the cricketer-turned-politician said that the Kartarpur corridor would open up infinite possibilities of peace and prosperity for both India and Pakistan.

“People of the Sikh community have long been denied the right to worship at Gurdwara Darbar Sahib Kartarpur. It is good to see that that would no longer be the case,” said Sidhu at an event on Tuesday.

“I feel that this corridor will be a bridge and erase enmity. It will increase people to people contact and bring peace. This is a corridor of infinite possibilities, of peace, of prosperity, of opening up of trade relations,” he added.

A huge stage – 20 feet in width and 60 feet in length – has been constructed for the ground-breaking ceremony. The construction work of the corridor is expected to begin shorty after the ground-breaking ceremony.

The work on the Indian side began on Monday after a formal ceremony.