Lahore: Parliamentarian Zora Singh Maan from the Akali Dal party has said that during tensions neither Islamabad nor New Delhi felt the pains of war but it was Punjab - Indian and Pakistani - that suffered the heavy losses.

Speaking at a reception hosted by the Joint Action Committee for People's Rights at a local hotel on August 9, Maan said that only the peoples of Indian and Pakistani Punjab felt the pains of war and the threat of missiles. He said that it was time to bury the hatchet for the sake of love and peace and the generations to come, reports 'The News'.

Former Chief Minister of Bihar Laloo Prasad Yadav was all out for peace between the two neighbours. He warned that if the two countries continued to fight each other, there would be no prosperity. He said the peace process should be started and "we should learn a lesson from invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq". He advocated people-to-people contacts, which would surely strengthen relations between the two neighbours.

Ram Ji Lal Suman, former Central Minister for Textile and an MP from Agra, maintained that the division of the subcontinent was "unjustified" and "now we should resume the severed relations". He said that war only brought devastation, so we should strive for peace.

Talib Hussain, an MP from occupied Jammu and Kashmir, said that the people wanted permanent peace between the two countries. He said that the situation in the subcontinent demanded that educated and peace-loving peoples should ponder on means and ways to create a lasting peace in the region. He said that Indian and Pakistani people loved each other.

Saleem Sherwani from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), Balbir Punj, Mani Shankar, Ramvilas Paswan and other Parliamentarians also stressed the need for utilising resources for education and elimination of poverty, instead of wasting them for jet fighters and weapons of mass destruction.

Krishna Moorti and other Parliamentarians from Andhra Paradesh said that people-to-people contact was a must for lasting peace and now hatred should end for good. Hina Jillani of the Joint Action Committee for People's Rights and Peace said that the Parliamentarians should take back the message of peace and love to India.

A large number of peace activists, intellectuals, representatives of NGOs, journalists, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan members and artists attended the function.

ANI