NEW DELHI, July 11: Pakistan expects to have a working consulate in Mumbai by the end of this year and, for the first time in the chequered history of the mission, Islamabad is going to pick up a slice of expensive real estate in India’s financial hub to construct a full-fledged facility there, informed sources said on Monday. “You can say this is a sign of our mutual quest for durable harmonious relations,” one official who is close to the India-Pakistan Mumbai deal told Dawn. “This is the first time that Pakistan will be acquiring real estate in Mumbai to build its mission there.”

Pakistan’s Special Secretary Sher Afgan is visiting Mumbai to supervise the acquisition of a bustling prime location in the Santa Cruz district of Mumbai, not far from the airport.

Officials of the Pakistan’s public works department are at hand to evaluate the feasibility of the project.

It seems that the naming of a consul general to head the mission is a mere formality. A former political secretary at Pakistan’s Delhi mission, who was a key player at the Agra summit, has been approached. Two other options are being sounded just in case.

Pakistan has sought a 7,000 square metre plot in Santa Cruz. There is some possibility of the quest being reduced to 4,000 square metres. The last Pakistani consul general had left Mumbai in 1994 amid palpable turbulence in bilateral ties.