Centre offers to rebuild gutted Sufi shrine in Srinagar

Union Home Minister P Chidambaram has said that the government has offered to rebuild Srinagar's Dustgeer Sahib, the famous Sufi shrine that was destroyed in a massive fire this week. He was addressing the media at Shastri Bhavan in New Delhi in his monthly meeting on Friday.

"I have talked to Union Minister for Renewable Energy Dr Farooq Abdullah and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and assured them that the central government will extend support to the state government in rebuilding 200-year-old shrine.

"The Indian National Trust for Arts and Culture has been asked to prepare architecture for the new building," he added.

Talking about Lashkar-e-Tayiba terrorist Abu Jundal's arrest, the minister refused to either confirm or deny the role of Saudi government leading to his arrest.

"We had been chasing him ever since we came to know of his involvement. His real name is Sayeed Ziabbuddin Ansari and he has a safe haven in Pakistan. He was part of the cell which was set up by the Inter-Service Intelligence. He is involved in several cases including the 26/11 attacks in Mumbai. He was also instrumental in providing training to Mohammad Ajmal Kasab. As of now, the Delhi police have him in their custody, and he is being interrogated by intelligence agencies," he said.

"I have written to the Maharashtra chief minister that Jundal would be made available to them and the Gujarat police for questioning," he said.

He denied that there was any tiff between the various investigating and intelligence agencies. "I would appeal to the media not to give credence to such reports," Chidambaram said.

Asked if the threat perception from Pakistan has gone down, the home minister said that it has remained the same.

When newspersons pointed out that Surjeet Singh, who was released from jail on Thursday, has claimed that he was an Indian spy and has had tea with VVIP's.

"We have no spies in Pakistan. People make tall claims to gain importance all the time," he said.