Nov 9, 2011, AMRITSAR: Despite regular Amritsar-Lahore bus service, not a single Sikh devotee from holy city on Tuesday boarded the bus for pilgrimage to Nanakana Sahib to celebrate the birth anniversary of Guru Nanak Dev, due to police vetting and other formalities required to undergo before boarding the bus.
As against an average load of about 10 passengers, the 45-seater Volvo bus carried 33 passengers including 22 Pakistanis, four other foreign nationals and five Indians to Lahore, but none from Amritsar.
"The bus service is a boon for people of holy city, but the number of formalities is the biggest dampener," Karnail Singh, a Canadian national, told TOI.
Karnail said he was surprised to know that anyone boarding the bus from Amritsar has to get police verification which was a time-consuming and tedious process, whereas there was no such formality for boarding the Delhi-Lahore bus.
Even SGPC has also been demanding to do away with police vetting and opening of a visa centre at Amritsar.
BJP MP Navjot Singh Sidhu said it was unfair that for boarding a bus to Pakistan, one has to visit Delhi for getting visa. "It is not only time consuming, but an expensive procedure," said Sidhu.
Ludhiana resident Satpal Singh, who had arrived to book his ticket, rued that he was first asked to produce police verification. "Earlier, I had to go to Delhi to take a visa and now, I have to go back to Ludhiana and get police verification done," he said.
Two buses ply on Tuesday and Friday for Lahore and Nankana Sahib respectively and return on next day.