Delhi-Nankana procession deferred due to quake

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October 13, 2005 16:36 IST

Organisers have suspended plans to take out a religious procession from Delhi to Nankana Sahib in Pakistan on October 23 after Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh suggested the event be deferred in the light of the ongoing earthquake relief activities in that country.

"The procession will now be taken out after November 15," Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee chief Paramjit Singh Sarna told PTI.

As originally planned, the Punjab chief minister was scheduled to accompany the processionists to Nankana Sahib, with his Pakistan Punjab counterpart Pervez Ellahi receiving them at Wagah on October 24.

Billed as "unprecedented" since the Partition, the event was to feature a specially-designed see-through bus carrying the sacred Guru Granth Sahib on a Rs 5 million gilded palanquin.

"It will be as grand an event as it was originally planned. The only thing is we now have to chalk out a new schedule in the light of the devastating earthquake that struck Pakistan on Saturday. I am visiting Pakistan on Sunday to work out the new schedule," Sarna said.

His remarks came after the Punjab chief minister's comments in Patiala Wednesday that the DSGMC should defer the event because of the massive earthquake in Pakistan.

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