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Sena not to protest if Pak PM comes calling

The Shiv Sena will not protest if Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharief decides to visit India, Maharashtra Chief Minister Narayan Rane has said.

Talking to the media last night, Rane said, ''A prime minister's visit to a foreign land has decorum and dignity attached to it.''

In this context he said that there was a difference between the Shiv Sena protest against the Pakistan cricket team's tour in India and the Jamaat-e-Islam protest against Vajpayee's visit to Lahore.

Rane said he would take a decision on Social Welfare Minister Babanrao Gholap, against whom the Anti-Corruption Bureau has filed a case in the court, after the court's judgment.

Earlier, Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray said he fully supported the Bajrang Dal's move to ban loud-speakers atop mosques and would ask the Maharashtra government to issue a directive against their use.

Thackeray said the Calcutta high court had delivered a judgment banning the use of loudspeakers in mosques. Shiv Sena member of Parliament Madhukar Sarpotdar had also filed a petition in the Bombay high court in the matter but no judgement has been delivered in the case, he said.

On whether the Sena would take any action against party rebels Ganesh Naik, Gulabrad Gawande and Suresh Nawale, who did not attend the special session of the state assembly, he said that he gave no importance to the three leaders.

UNI

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