NEW DELHI, Feb 9: When four of the five expelled Pakistani officials in India will be heading home by a land crossing on Monday, the fifth one would be bracing for Haj in Saudi Arabia where he was

on Thursday when the latest diplomatic row was unfolding, diplomatic sources said on Sunday.

The sources told Dawn that Habibur Rehman was in Saudi Arabia when an alleged incident in which Pakistani officials, including acting high commissioner Jaleel Abbas Jilani, were said to have given money to a Kashmiri activist happened.

The incident was denied by Mr Jilani. But India’s junior home minister I.D. Swami said in a TV programme that the Delhi police was swearing by the diplomat’s culpability, and that it was only because of the government’s decision not to press the charges that the police did not seek Mr Jilani’s conviction.

Among those who would not believe Mr Swami nor anything that would cast Pakistani or Indian officials as villains was India’s renowned peace activist Nirmala Deshpande. She visited Mr Jilani’s disrupted home and expressed solidarity “on behalf of millions of Indians” with the diplomat and his wife Shaista.

Shaista said she would leave soon but within a week with their three sons by the Wagah border, a facility she regretted was denied to most, possibly needier, Indian and Pakistani citizens for more than a year.

Diplomatic sources expressed surprise at Saturday’s expulsion orders by India and the tit-for-tat response by Pakistan. They said though India had stated that it was willing to give a “visa at the earliest” for Mr Jilani’s replacement, the request has been pending for quite some time.

Apparently, Pakistan too has yet to grant a visa to T.C.A. Raghavan, which was sought as replacement for Indian Charge d’Affaires in Pakistan Sudhir Vyas in July 2002.

For its part, India is still to give a visa to Munawar Saeed Bhatty, sought in November 2002, to replace Mr Jilani.

One predictable victim of the India-Pakistan bruising was All Parties Hurriyat Conference.

APHC sources said that following the arrest of their activists Anjum Zamrooda Habib and Shabir Dar, for allegedly receiving funds from the Pakistan high commission, the Hurriyat office in New Delhi was forced to close down, even though the landlord rather than the official route was used to serve the eviction notice.

Reports said the closure of the APHC office followed a protest at the premises by members of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad.

Indian media reports said Mr Vyas and four more officials expelled by Pakistan would leave by road on Monday. They would leave in a convoy of vehicles by road around 8am PST on Monday and reach the Wagah border point by noon.

“I think that all those members of the civil society in India who do not believe in this unsubstantiated and baseless allegations against me should speak out,” Mr Jilani said as he prepared to leave.

“I have received a lot of support and sympathy from a large number of Indian friends, including senior members of the Indian media, both from the print media and television,” he said.

He said the three main issues listed by the head of the BJP for the elections were national security, removal of Article 370 relating to Kashmir and the construction of the Ram temple as elections issues were sought to be linked to Pakistan one way or another.

“If you closely analyze the election issues, it should leave no one in doubt that they will be used to heighten tensions between India and Pakistan.”

Mr Jilani was happy that “the overriding good news is that people in both countries have a genuine bond of peace and friendship and they may yet surprise us all by changing the hostile political agenda into one of peace”.