Thousands of Sikhs celebrate harvest festival in Pakistan

Some 2,000 Sikhs travelled to Pakistan from neighbouring India despite recent tensions between the two nuclear-armed rivals.

By Mazhar Ali
Indian Sikh pilgrims arrive at Wagah Railway Station at Pakistan's Wagah border on April 12, 2019, to celebrate Baisakhi (Sikh New Year). / AFP

Thousands of Sikh pilgrims from across the world gathered at a shrine in Pakistan to celebrate the Vaisakhi harvest festival amid heightened security.

Some 2,000 Sikhs travelled to Pakistan from neighbouring India despite recent tensions between the two nuclear-armed rivals. 

Sikhs are a small minority in Muslim-majority Pakistan, but many Sikh holy sites ended up in the country after the 1947 partition from India following independence from Britain.

TRT World's Kamran Yusuf reports.