Islamabad: India has handed over to Pakistan recordings of two important speeches by the country's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah, a step that was welcomed here with much joy.
The speeches by Jinnah includes one recorded by All India Radio in New Delhi on June 3‚ 1947 - two months before partition - in which he gives his reaction to holding a referendum in the NWFP on the region joining Pakistan or India.
The second recording is his August 14 address where he talks about the "welfare and well-being of all the communities" in Pakistan.
"We have received both the speeches. We are very happy and thankful to All India Radio," Javed Khan Jadoon, Head Current Affairs, Pakistan Radio told PTI.
He said the speeches were received over the internet and officials here downloaded and transferred them to a CD.
"This will become part of our archives. I spoke to AIR Director yesterday and he has promised all help in case we need any recordings prior to 1947 also," he said.
Asked when the speeches would be played to the people of Pakistan, he said an editorial decision is yet to be made.
On March 29, 2012, the then Pakistan Broadcasting Cooperation chief Murtaza Solangi wrote to AIR Director General Leeladhar Mandloi, requesting him to provide a copy of Jinnah's first presidential address to the constituent assembly in Karachi.
Solangi noted that he was told during his visit to the AIR in November 2011 that the speech was in the archives.
In that speech, Jinnah spoke of his vision of Pakistan as a state with equal citizens, irrespective of community, colour, caste and creed, and said people were free to go to their places of worship.
But AIR later said it did not have a copy of that specific speech.
