India News and Travel Times Provides India-centric and other News and Features

Pakistan’s Foreign Office on Sunday asked India to provide Islamabad with proof that people in Pakistan were behind the fanning of an exodus of people from the northeast from across India . Television channel Times Now quoted Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Moazzam Khan, as saying that New Delhi needed to substantially prove the allegation for authorities in Pakistan to take appropriate action, if any. Khan’s reported comment comes a day after India ’s Home Secretary Raj Kumar Singh categorically stated that Pakistan is the origin of the bulk of SMS and MMS transmissions that prompted the exodus of thousands of people hailing from India 's northeastern states to flee from across the country. Singh clarified that designated intelligence agencies have confirmed this news and also mentioned that this matter would be now taken up with the External Affairs Ministry. "Bulk of these messages and these clips have their origin in our western neighbourhood in Pakistan . That is what our agencies has discovered that bulk of these have been uploaded in various websites in Pakistan and that shows the thing," said Singh. Rumours had been circulating that people from northeast India who live in Bangalore -- nearly 2,000 miles (3,000 kilometres) -- to the south, are about to be attacked en masse. This is because of violence that flared between Bodo tribes and Bangladeshi Muslim immigrants in the northeastern state of Assam in July. Singh also said that the photographs, which are being circulated across the country, as victims of ethnic riots were actually the photographs of cyclone and earthquake affected people. "Number of people whose photographs were being circulated which had photographs of people died in cyclone and they were being portrayed as people who have been killed in violence in Myanmar . The photographs of damage in earthquake and they were being circulated as the houses of minority community damaged in violence in Bodo territorial area districts," said Singh. Muslims across India have been alarmed by clashes in recent weeks between indigenous people in Assam and Muslim settlers from neighbouring Bangladesh . At least 77 people have been killed and more than 400,000 are crowded into filthy refugee camps. As a result of this SMS transmitted to people hailing from northeastern states of India , on Wednesday, almost 6,000 people had booked tickets to Guwahati in Assam . Consequently intelligence agencies had blocked several websites and restricted bulk messages with an aim to thwart the panic stricken messages and mails. Singh said that seven people have been identified for spreading rumours across the Bangalore . "74 such websites have been blocked already. 34 more have been identified by one of the intelligence agencies. Those 34 will also be blocked. Seven people have been identified as having originated or circulating these messages in Karnataka. Out of these three have been arrested and four are being located," said Singh.

India must prove Pak's role in fanning northeast exodus: Pak Foreign Office