KARACHI: Khawaja Shahabuddin, Central Information and Broadcasting Minister, yesterday warned India against its aggressive policy towards Pakistan and said if India continued to follow this policy the armed forces of Pakistan would meet the aggression properly. He said the armed forces of Pakistan, under the able command of [their] officers, were well equipped to defend the sovereignty of the country and guard it against outside aggression.

He was speaking at a reception held in his honour by Hafiz Mohammad Habibullah, Vice-Chairman of the Karachi Municipal Corporation, on behalf of the Chairmen of Union Committees of Karachi. He said, intoxicated by its vast and tremendous military power augmented by massive arms aid, India was considering the present uprising in occupied Kashmir as “trifle and a joke” and considered the small force of Mujahids as too meagre to be of any consequence. — Agencies

[Meanwhile, as reported by our correspondent in New Delhi,] a member of the Indian Parliament has claimed that Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the Frontier Red Shirt leader, was “prepared” to come to India if the Government and people promised to support the so-called “Pakhtoon­istan” movement. The MP, Mr Kamalnayan Bajaj who recently returned from Afghanistan quoted Ghaffar Khan “as saying that he would visit India for talks if the latter could extend me support for Pakhtoonistan”.

In an interview circulated by Press Trust of India, Mr Bajaj claimed that Ghaffar Khan had “rejected” Pakistan’s request to return to Pakis­tan. Mr Bajaj quoted Badshah Khan as making wild allegations against Pakistan. He is also reported as saying that the demand for Pakhtoonistan was not a communal one but “humane and spiritual”. The present interview given by Mr Bajaj is not the first of its kind.

Published in Dawn, September 1st, 2015

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