The minister was talking to the local C-42 TV channel where he had gone to offer condolences over the death of its technician who was covering the Friday's terror attack on an Ahmadi place of worship in Garhi Shahu.
“There will be an operation in south Punjab on the pattern of tribal areas,” the channel quoted the minister as saying.
Although the Friday attack revived calls from various quarters for launching an operation in south Punjab, the PML-N which rules the province has denied that it is the hub of Punjabi Taliban.
“Army operations are required only where there are no-go areas and there is no such situation in any part of Punjab,” said Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah while talking to Dawn.
He described the minister's statement as an attempt to destabilise the province.
Mr Malik also visited the worship place of Ahmadis in Model Town which also was attacked by terrorists.
The attacks left 95 people dead and over 100 injured. The minister also visited the injured in city hospitals.
Mr Malik told journalists that 726 of the 1,764 members of banned organisations like Lakhkar-i-Jhangvi and Jaish-i-Mohammad belonged to south Punjab. The region, he said, also had about 44 per cent of the country's religious seminaries.
“I am not here to confront the Punjab government (on the south Punjab issue) but want to seek its cooperation to fight terrorists jointly,” he said. But, he made it clear that the monitoring of the members of these organisations (in south Punjab) was necessary.
“The militants in south Punjab had also established links in Balochistan and had tried to trigger clashes between Deobandis and Barelvis in Karachi before attacking Ahmadis in Lahore,” the minister said.
He said that members of banned groups like LJ and JM from Punjab had gone to the tribal areas and received training there.
“They then came back to Punjab and became part of sleeper cells. The militants who were hiding in south Punjab are now surfacing. I have been saying for the last one year that these people (Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, Sipah-i-Sahaba and Jaish-i-Mohammed) are enemies of the country and are part of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and Al Qaeda,” he said, adding that the banned organisations like JM, LJ and SSP had also joined hands with the Taliban and Al Qaeda to destabilise the country.
“The Taliban and its allied groups have adopted a new strategy after the successful military operations in Fata and they are trying to trigger infighting among different sects,” the interior minister said.
He said these militants were targeting people of all sects and religions.
“They have attacked Sunnis, Shias, Christians, Hindus and Ahmadis,” he added.
In reply to a question about involvement of a 'foreign hand' in the attacks on Friday, the minister said he would not say anything without having received evidence.
“When the Lahore Commissioner said about involvement of RAW, I said if you have evidence then give it to me.”
He parried a question about Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah's 'links' with the SSP.
Mr Malik said that the federal government would also provide logistics and enhance the capacity of law-enforcement agencies to help the provincial governments to fight terrorists.
He said about 17,000 of the total of 20,000 seminaries had been registered and a central authority to oversee their functioning would soon be established.
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