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17 April 2005
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Sunday
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07 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1426
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Musharraf prays for peace: Visit to Ajmer shrine
AJMER, April 16: President Pervez Musharraf offered prayers for peace here at the shrine of Hazrat Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti (RA), kicking off his three-day visit to India on Saturday.
“Please let our prayer for peace, harmony and amity between Pakistan and India and prosperity of both the countries be answered,” he wrote in the visitor’s book at the tomb.
President Musharraf arrived by helicopter in Ajmer, some 130km from Jaipur, and was driven in a bullet-proof car to the mausoleum.
“We have brought a message of peace from Pakistan,” he said.
“I have prayed for peace between India and Pakistan and the development of India and Pakistan.
“Development of the two countries and people can happen only if there is peace. We hope peace prevails in the whole region,” the president said
Accompanied by his wife Begum Sehba Musharraf, Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri and Pakistan High Commissioner to India Aziz Ahmed Khan, the president was presented with flowers and offered a crimson ‘chaadar’ to lay over the tomb.
A group of khuddam escorted the president into the sanctum. He gifted one million rupees to the complex and was handed two chaadars to cover shrines in Pakistan.
“Me, my wife and my entire delegation are very happy that we came to the dargah and we are standing in front of you,” said Gen Musharraf, resplendent in a large pink turban.
Gen Musharraf had intended to pray at the tomb during his last trip to India in 2001. It was to be his final engagement, capping two days of talks with then Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee in Agra.
But the talks collapsed over Kashmir and the president left for home without visiting the shrine.
“I consider it my honour and also my entire delegations’ to have prayed at the shrine of the most revered Sufi saint, Hazrat Moinundin Chishti,” he added in the visitors’ book.
Wasim Chishti, a mausoleum official who claims descent from the saint, told AFP: “The last time Baba did not call him so he could not come here. He is fortunate that Baba has called him this time.”
Gen Musharraf’s visit came on an auspicious day, he added, explaining that the monthly prayers to mark the saint’s death fell on Saturday.—AFP
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