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An outfit, “Maharashtra Cine, TV Sena,” has asked the Hindi film industry to desist from hiring singers and artistes from Pakistan in the wake of the recent arrest of noted Pakistani singer Rahat Fateh Ali Khan. It threatened to “teach a lesson in our Shiv Sena style” if anybody engaged them.

Sends letters

In letters sent to all “production houses, organisers, event managers and media houses,” the outfit drew attention to the recent incident in which Fateh Ali Khan and his assistant and Indian manager Chitresh Srivastav were detained on the charge of “money laundering.

The outfit asked them to abstain from engaging such artistes, “who had put the entire film fraternity to shame.”

Disclosing the letters’ contents to reporters on the sidelines of a seminar on “can composite culture survive the onslaught of terrorism?” here on Sunday, filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt said one should remember that bridges were built with great difficulty to remove bitterness through art, cinema and culture.

He dismissed the claim that Indian artistes were becoming jobless due to hiring of Pakistani artistes. He pointed out that it was wrong, as Pakistani artistes sung only 10 or 12 in every thousand songs recorded here.

Asked about the Shiv Sena’s stand against Pakistan cricket players in the ongoing world cup, Chairman of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission Iqbal Haidar said the Sena should realise that such extremist expressions of hatred only promoted terrorism.

Charge against U.S.

Mr. Haidar accused the United States and its allies of supporting the Taliban to destabilise South Asia.

Urging India and Pakistan to stop the blame-game and adopt a joint policy to fight terror, he wanted both the countries to either dismantle the visa regime or put in place a visa-on-arrival policy.

Veteran journalist Kuldip Nayyar expressed the concern that the glue of composite culture and pluralism was drying up. He called for preserving the pluralistic fabric of the country.

While pointing out that the basic structure of the Constitution relating to secularism and democracy could not be altered, he expressed concern over the mixing of religion with politics.

Communist Party of India Rajya Sabha member Azeez Pasha said a handful of individuals could not shake India’s secularism and composite culture.

Popular ghazal singer Jagjit Singh, Tourism Secretary Jayesh Ranjan, poet Chaman Lal Chaman and Siasat daily news editor Amir Ali Khan also addressed the seminar.