The government’s decision, it is learnt, is due to Pakistan’s decision to invite representatives of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference. India had very strongly objected to Pakistan’s foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi telephoning Hurriyat leaders ahead of an event organised in London

NEW DELHI: In a rare and strong rebuke to Pakistan, India has decided not to send any official representative to the Pakistan National Day event hosted by the high commission on Friday.

The Indian government’s decision, it is learnt, is due to Pakistan’s decision to invite representatives of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference — an amalgam of separatist parties in Kashmir with demands ranging from greater autonomy to secession from India — to the National Day event.

New Delhi has in the past insisted that Pakistan hold talks with India directly over differences over Kashmir and other issues and discouraged contacts with the Hurriyat leaders.

India had very strongly objected to Pakistan’s foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi telephoning Hurriyat leaders ahead of an event organised in London to mark Islamabad’s solidarity with Kashmir’s so called freedom movement earlier this year. Previously, Pakistani insistence of talking and consulting with Hurriyat leaders ahead of official peace talks with India had wrecked plans at least twice for both countries to resume the official peace dialogue stalled since 2013.

In previous years, Indian political representatives who have attended Pakistan’s National Day events include minister of State for external affairs V.K. Singh and minister of state for agriculture Gajendra Singh Shekhawat as well as former minister of state for external affairs M.J Akbar. It is customary for an embassy to invite a political representative for their national day event and the government decides on its representative to the event based on the importance of the country in New Delhi’s strategic thinking.

Last year for example, Indian foreign minister Sushma Swaraj had attended an event hosted by the Russian embassy. Swaraj’s attendance followed a reset in ties by India and Russia with Indian prime minister Narendra Modi visiting Sochi for a one day informal summit with president Vladimir Putin in May. In February this year, transport minister Nitin Gadkari had attended the Iran National Day event at the Iranian embassy in New Delhi, in a clear signal of Tehran’s importance to India. New Delhi is developing the Chahbahar Port in a bid to access Afghanistan and Central Asia bypassing Pakistan.

India’s strong signal of its disapproval of the Pakistan action comes amid tensions between the two countries following the 14 February Pulwama attack in which at least 40 paramilitary personnel were killed when a suicide bomber rammed a car full of explosives into a bus they were travelling in.

The Indian Air Force on 26 February bombed a Jaish e Mohammed terrorist training camp inside Pakistan with Indian foreign secretary Vijay Gokhale later stating that this came in the face of “imminent" danger other similar suicide attacks. Pakistan sent its fighter jets to target Indian military installations in Kashmir leading to India scrambling its fighter jets to thwart the Pakistani intrusion.

Pakistan marks its National Day on 23 March in recognition of the passage of the Lahore declaration on that day in 1940 that called for the creation of a separate state of Pakistan for Muslims in Indian subcontinent after the independence of India from British rule.