Kartarpur corridor: Officials from MEA, MHA hold meeting with Pakistan authorities to discuss modalities

Chandigarh: Officials from Pakistan and India on Monday held a meeting to discuss the modalities for a corridor linking Dera Baba Nanak shrine in Punjab’s Gurdaspur district to Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur across the border. The meeting lasted for about two hours and a host of issues pertaining to the building of the corridor were discussed, an official said. The meeting took place at the Kartarpur Zero Point. [caption id=“attachment_5280281” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Sushma Swaraj. Reuters[/caption] The group from the Indian side had officials from the Ministry of External Affairs, Ministry of Home Affairs, Land Ports Authority of India, National Highways Authority of India, among others, the official said. Earlier in April, technical experts and foreign office officials from both the sides had participated in the talks held at the same venue. In a major initiative last November, both India and Pakistan agreed to set up the Kartarpur corridor to link the historic Gurdwara Darbar Sahib — the final resting place of Guru Nanak Dev — to Dera Baba Nanak in Gurdaspur. Kartarpur Sahib is located in Pakistan’s Narowal district across the Ravi river, about four kilometres from the Dera Baba Nanak shrine. India and Pakistan had on 19 March held a meeting of technical experts on the Kartarpur corridor during which its alignment, coordinates and other engineering aspects of the proposed crossing points were discussed. The technical meeting at the level of experts, including engineers and surveyors, was held at “proposed zero points” in the follow-up to the decision reached on the 14 March meeting. During the previous meeting, both the sides jointly surveyed the coordinates of the Zero Point and discussed the technical details, including finished road level, high flood level, etc. Pakistan will build the corridor from the Indian border to the Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur, while the other part from Dera Baba Nanak in Gurdaspur up to the border will be constructed by India. The corridor will be opened in November in connection with the 550th birth anniversary of Sikhism’s founder Guru Nanak Dev.