While work is underway to build a corridor for Indian pilgrims to visit Kartarpur Sahib gurdwara in Pakistan, a demand is pending for a similar facility for Sharda Peeth temple, ancient shrine located in Pakistan-administered Kashmir and revered by Kashmiri Pandits.
India has proposed to Pakistan that devotees be allowed tovisit the temple, situated in Neelum valley, about 140 kms from PaK’s capitalMuzaffarabad, but it has not accepted the same.
Kashmiri Pandits, campaigning for the facility, argue thatthe pilgrimage can be allowed on the lines of Line of Control (LoC) permitsystem, under which residents of Jammu and Kashmir on either side of the dividecan travel to the other side.
The LoC permit system is to enable residents of Jammu andKashmir to travel across the divide to meet their relatives only.
“We want that there should be an amendment to thisagreement between India and Pakistan to include pilgrimage in thearrangement,” Ravinder Pandita, founder of Save Sharda Committee, toldIANS.
Pandita, who is leading the campaign through hisorganization, has raised this demand at various levels in the government ofIndia, but were told about the complications involved.
Significantly, however, the Pakistan government organized atour by a five-member delegation of Pakistan Hindu Council to the temple onJune 26.
“Hindus, even though of Pakistan, visited the templeafter 72 years. Now, the Pakistan government should consider allowing ourdelegation to visit the temple,” Pandita told IANS, while speaking abouthis efforts for access to the shrine.
In the meanwhile, he has been writing to the administrationand even the ‘Supreme Court’ of PaK, requesting maintenance and upkeep of thetemple.
In response to a letter addressed to the ‘Chief Justice’ ofPaK, Chaudhary Muhammad Ibrahim Zia, the registrar of the Supreme Court of PaKwrote to Pandita in January last year, saying the court has already issueddirections to the authorities for “protection of the religious places andtemples, such as temples and gurdwaras etc…. In case (of) failure on the part ofstate functionaries in carrying out of the judgements, you may approach thiscourt for redressal of your grievance.”He also wrote to the Archaeological Survey ofPakistan, urging it to ensure that people do not enter the sanctum sanctorum ofthe temple with their shoes on. This has also been done.