New Delhi/Kabul, Oct 6 (UNI) Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and Deputy Chief Minister Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa on Wednesday condemned the vandalism at the Kabul Gurdwara by suspected Taliban fighters, and urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to intervene in the matter on priority.
Channi, in a tweet, said they stand by the Sikh community in Afghanistan, and urged the central government to address the issue at the international level.
Randhawa urged PM Modi to give asylum to the minority Afghan Sikhs and Hindus in India.
“The attack at Gurdwara Karte Parwan in Kabul by armed Taliban officials is highly condemnable. We are with our Sikh community in Afghanistan. I request the Union Govt & External Affairs Minister @DrSJaishankar to address this issue on priority at the international level,” Channi said on Twitter.
“I condemn the sabotage of Parwan Sahib, the historic Gurdwara of Kabul, by the Taliban terrorists. I urge Prime Minister @narendramodi to please appeal to the @UN, and give asylum to the minorities in India,” Randhawa said in a tweet in Punjabi.
Meanwhile, the identities of the armed men who entered the Karte Parwan Gurdwara in Kabul on Tuesday is still not known.
Ram Sharan Singh, an Afghan Hindu gentleman living in Kabul, told UNI over phone that Afghan security personnel and the “CBI” (investigative agency) came on Tuesday and checked the premises and took the CCTV camera recordings.
“They will tell us who the persons were. We will come to know when they announce it publicly,” Ram Sharan Singh told UNI on Wednesday.
Asked about the suspicion that the men were Taliban fighters as they were attired typically like them, in loose shalwar-kameez, turban, and with flowing beard, Ram Sharan Singh said: “Nowadays everyone dresses like that, so it is difficult to say who were the people who entered the Gurdwara”.
Asked if the Afghan Sikh and Hindu community were fine, he said: “Yes, we are safe.”
On Tuesday, a group of heavily armed men, resembling the Taliban militia in appearance, entered the Gurdwara Karte Parwan in Kabul, tied up the three guards there, rummaged through the cupboards of the gurdwara office and left after smashing some CCTV cameras.
Gurnam Singh, an Afghan Sikh living in Kabul, told UNI on phone on Tuesday that some unidentified armed persons, around 15-16 in number, entered the Gurdwara Karte Parwan in the late afternoon and "bound the hands and feet of the three guards there".
“They smashed some CCTVs cameras on their way out. We informed the local authorities and they were at the Gurdwara to inspect the damage,” Gurnam Singh said on phone.
Ram Sharan Singh said they had handed over the CCTV footage “to the CBI here. They will check the footage and we will know about the identities of the men,” Singh told UNI.
CCTV footage of the incident shows men dressed like the Taliban fighters rummaging through drawers of the Gurdwara office. They also broke some locks of doors at the Gurdwara.
UNI/RN