India condemns Pak's 'arbitrary' decision of transferring management of Kartarpur Gurudwara

India has strongly condemned Pakistan for transferring the management of Gurudwara Kartarpur Sahib away from the Pakistan Sikh Gurudwara Prabhandhak Committee (PSGPC) to "project management unit" a non-Sikh body under the Evacuee Trust Property Board. 

The unit is headed by one Tariq Khan and has nine members, none of them being a Sikh.

The ministry of external affairs in a strongly worded release said, "unilateral decision" by Pakistan "runs against the spirit" of the Kartarpur Sahib Corridor as also the "religious sentiments of the Sikh community at large."

New Delhi had already received representations from a large number of the members of the Sikh community who have expressed "grave concern" at the Pakistan's action. It's for the first time that the Pakistan Sikh Gurdwara Parbandhak Committee has scrapped off its management rights of this sacred Gurudwara.

The MEA said, "Such actions only expose the reality of the Pakistani government and its leadership’s tall claims of preserving and protecting the rights and welfare of the religious minority communities."

India called on Islamabad to "reverse its arbitrary decision to deprive" the Sikh minority community "it’s right to manage affairs of the Holy Gurudwara Kartarpur Sahib."

Founder of Sikhism Guru Nanak Dev ji, spent the last 18 years of his life in the Gurudwara which is just a few kilometres away from the International border with India.