25th December 2015, when the world was celebrating Christmas, Indian Prime Minister was strengthening ties with the neighbours. Visited Kabul to inaugurate India built Afghanistan Parliament building. And on his way, he paid a surprise and unexpected visit to our rival nation Pakistan. It was Nawaz Sharif’s birthday and Modi decided to drop in for an evening high tea with him to give him good wishes. And there was an outflow of emotions in India!! The television flooded with the news and views. This became the hot topic of discussion for the Christmas supper.
A Pakistani daily, The Nation, quoted, “It is the last-minute-plan that did the trick. If the media and powerful anti-peace lobbies were fed the news of any meeting beforehand, they would have ruined it all by their obsession with reading between the lines.”
Modi’s visit is the first by an Indian Prime Minister to Pakistan since the 2008 Mumbai attacks, first in decades!!
Where Pakistan opposition welcomed Mr. Modi with more than open arms, Indian opposition had its share of condemnation for him. An activist from an opposition party set a picture of Narendra Modi on fire after hearing about his visit to Pakistan.
Shiv Sena attacked Mr. Modi’s surprise visit to Pakistan and said that he should seek an apology from the nation for taking such an “objectionable step”.
Sena’s Punjab President SanjivGhanauli, Chairman Rajiv Tandon and Senior Vice-President Rajesh Palta said that “the sudden stopover in Lahore would embolden Pakistan and send wrong signals globally that India was under pressure vis-a-vis its relations with the neighbouring country.”
Congress Party called Mr Modi’s visit irresponsible and said that nothing had happened to warrant warming of ties between the rivals. “If the decision is not preposterous then it is utterly ridiculous,” Congress leader Manish Tewari said. So it is being speculated rather confidently stated that this visit was pre planned but not disclosed until it actually happened.
It was breaking news in international arena as well. While the mainstream American media hailed the brief stopover as a significant development in the relationship between the two South Asian neighbours, newspapers in Pakistan, like The Express Tribune said it was a “step towards normalising ties between the two neighbours which have fought three wars.”
Disparagements and criticisms did not end here. People were more enraged by the fact that till thenMr. Modi could go to wish Nawaz Sharif but could not go to Mr. Vajpayee!!It was incidentally former Prime Minister Mr. Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s 91st birthday. Little did they know till then that Mr. Modi is well aware about expectations from him and he landed straight to Mr. Vajpayee’s residence from the airport and gave him good wishes on his birthday.
Being a concerned citizen of India, I can only laugh out with the way opposition and some of my other fellow mates are reacting to the entire situation. I agree that Pakistan is the hub of terrorism, there have not been very many good instances of Pakistan lending a hand of friendship towards India. But then isn’t it that the United States has a long and torrid history of backing terrorist groups. (Source: http://www.globalresearch.ca/america-created-al-qaeda-and-the-isis-terror-group/5402881)
Isn’t it so that countries like UK and Australia,threw Indians out of jobs when there was recession or terrorist attacks in their countries? Still our country never criticised Mr. Modi when he was out building relations with these countries.
My only worry is that if there are some steps being taken, why it is always that there is lot of disapproval. I sincerely don’t think that by NOT meeting or talking, problems can be resolved. If by taking on step, things can improvise, why not take that chance?
