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ISLAMABAD: Despite strong tensions over Kashmir, Pakistan and India will sign the agreement that would govern the operations of the Kartarpur Corridor without a visa for the Sikh Indian pilgrims. <\/p>\n
The Foreign Ministry spokesman, Dr. Muhammad Faisal, while talking with Dawn<\/em>, confirmed that an agreement on the draft had been reached and that both parties would sign it soon. He said "the dates for signing the agreement were being resolved." <\/p>\n The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of India (MEA) had previously said in a press release that the Indian government had transmitted its readiness "to sign the Agreement on the Kartarpur Sahib Corridor on October 23, 2019". <\/p>\n The details of the agreement were negotiated since March. The first round of talks took place on March 14 on the Indian side of the Attari-Wagah border. Together with the officials' level conversations, both parties held several rounds of expert level meetings to discuss technical aspects of the project. <\/p>\n Pilgrim facilities are scheduled to open on November 9 <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n So far there have been three rounds of conversations at the level of officials. <\/p>\n The two sides, during their negotiations, continued to differ on several issues ranging from the number of pilgrims to the number of days that the corridor would remain open and the composition of the Sikh Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee of Pakistan (PSGPC), which had been established to facilitate To the Sikhs. pilgrims <\/p>\n The last point of conflict was the $ 20 service fee that Pakistan decided to charge each Sikh pilgrim using the corridor. <\/p>\n Dr. Faisal said the problem had been resolved. <\/p>\n But, in its statement, MEA seemed to have reluctantly accepted the rate, as it urged Pakistan to review it. <\/p>\n "It is disappointing that, while understanding of most of the elements to facilitate the visit of pilgrims from India has been achieved, Pakistan continues to insist on charging a service fee of USD 20 per pilgrim per visit," MEA said in its release. . <\/p>\n In addition, he said: "While agreeing to sign the agreement, the Government of Pakistan has been urged again to reconsider its insistence on imposing a service fee on pilgrims." India would be willing to modify the agreement accordingly at any time. " <\/p>\n Sikh leaders in India also expressed disappointment at the visa fee. The Union minister, Harsimrat Kaur Badal, called it "shameful" and in a video posted on social networks accused the Pakistani government of "doing business by faith" and using the rate to "boost the economy." <\/p>\n Meanwhile, Punjab Prime Minister Amarinder Singh, who seemed polite, tweeted: \u201cI appeal to @ImranKhanPTI to withdraw the $ 20 fee imposed by @pid_gov to pilgrims to Kartarpur Sahib to facilitate [sic] * \u2018Khulle darshan deedar\u2019 * from the final resting place of SRI Guru Nanak Dev Ji. The Sikh world community will thank you for this gesture. \u201d <\/p>\n The corridor, which would provide visa-free access to Indian Sikh pilgrims to Kartarpur Gurdwara, is scheduled to open on November 9 before the 550th anniversary of the birth of Guru Nanak Dev Ji that is celebrated on November 12. Former Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was invited to the inaugural ceremony but only agreed to come as an ordinary pilgrim. <\/p>\n The opening ceremony of the corridor was held in November last year after Delhi agreed to a Pakistani proposal to provide access without Indian Sikhs visa to the Gurdwara in Kartarpur Sahib. <\/p>\n Up to 5,000 Sikh pilgrims can use the Corridor on any day to make pilgrimages.<\/p>\n Posted on Dawn, October 22, 2019<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/pre>\n<\/pre>\n Source: https:\/\/www.dawn.com\/news\/1512151\/pakistan-india-agree-on-service-fee-for-kartarpur-corridor<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ISLAMABAD: Despite strong tensions over Kashmir, Pakistan and India will sign the agreement that would govern the operations of the Kartarpur Corridor without a visa for the Sikh Indian pilgrims. The Foreign Ministry spokesman, Dr. Muhammad Faisal, while talking with Dawn, confirmed that an agreement on the draft had been reached and that both parties […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9535,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[11077],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9534","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newspaper"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9534","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9534"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9534\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9534"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umang.pk\/ur\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n