Pak launches search op for Badals’ missing kin

Pakistan has launched an investigation to trace a distant female relative of Sukhbir Singh Badal, the Deputy Chief Minister of Indian Punjab, who has been missing in Lahore for the past two-and-half months.

Rajvindar Kaur Gill, a Canadian citizen of Indian origin, went missing shortly after she arrived in Lahore last August to attend a conference.

Her father, Sikandar Singh, wrote a letter to Sukhbir, seeking his help in finding his daughter. Sukhbir handed over a copy of the letter to Pakistan Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif during his visit to Lahore earlier this month.

"Dear brother, since I know you have strong relations with the Pakistan Punjab Chief Minister, we are optimistic that she will be brought to home safely," Singh wrote in the letter.

Singh further wrote that he had served in the Indian Air Force before moving to Canada 13 years ago. Other members of his family, including Rajvindar, who is in her 30s, joined him in 2007.

"My daughter then moved to Switzerland after she got a job in a bank in Zurich. She went to Lahore to attend a conference in August 2012 and remained in touch with me for a few days.

"She also went to Gurdwara Janamasthan, Nankana Sahib. She told me that she was going to meet a journalist, Iqbal Hussain of News One, before we lost contact with her," Singh wrote.

Imdad Bhatti, a journalist of the Urdu daily Jang, told PTI that Singh had spoken to him by phone from Canada.

He quoted Singh as saying that his daughter had fallen in love with a man whom she met on the Internet and who had introduced himself as Krishna from Lahore. Bhatti said Singh had told him that his daughter went to Lahore to meet Krishna. It was not clear whether Krishna "was an imposter or not".

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