Daily Times

After attending the swearing-in ceremony of Prime Minister Imran Khan in Pakistan, cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu in an interview with NDTV on Saturday said he came to the country with a message of peace.

Sidhu’s visit to Pakistan sparked backlash from conservative quarters in India, including Haryana Minister Anil Vij and activists belonging to Indian PM Narendra Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party, who lashed out at the Indian politician and termed his participating in the ceremony “an act of disloyalty” towards India.

Sidhu said it was a great honour to have been invited to Khan’s oath-taking ceremony.

Sidhu who was seen embracing Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Qamar Bajwa before the start of ceremony, said: “Bajwa sahab walks up to me and says, ‘You know, I’m a general who wanted to be a cricketer’.”

On his second encounter with the Pakistan Army chief, Sidhu said: “He was very warm and said, ‘Navjot, we want peace’. That was wonderful to hear.”

He said that Gen Bajwa also talked about opening the Kartarpur route on the 550th birthday of Baba Guru Nanak. “It was like a dream come true and I was so overjoyed.”

“He asked, ‘Happy?’ I said, ‘Yes sir, I’m very happy,’ and he came forward and said, ‘We’ll even think of doing better things,'” Sidhu told NDTV.

When asked what one could expect from the new prime minister, Sidhu said, “There will be no compromises. He will not compromise.”

“The second thing that I can be very sure of is that he has clarity of thought. He will listen to everybody, but he will do what he thinks is the right perspective.”

“I have hope, and I have that trust. Only time will tell, the next six months, one year. Nobody can come up with a policy and implement it in five to six months. That’s too early. I think you’ve got to give someone at least a year to assess the direction in which he is going to go.”

Recalling PM Khan’s first address to the nation after the election, in which the PTI chief had said if India took one step forward, Pakistan would take two ? Sidhu expressed hope that India would take that one step.

However, he added, “Whatever has to be done, has to be done by the government.”

“I think we need to take cognisance of the fact that this is a change, and any change will bring hope,” he added.

“I pray to God that India takes that one step, because this is something which is new, this is something which is a new dawn, and ultimately, if we have to move forward [with] peace and talks on the table, moving in a positive direction is the only way.”

Published in Daily Times, August 20^th 2018.