India, Pak spar over SRK; worry about your security, Home Secy tells Malik

New Delhi: India has responded strongly to Pakistan Interior Minister Rehman Malik's demand for security for actor Shah Rukh Khan. Home Secretary RK Singh has asked Rehman Malik to worry about the security of Pakistan's citizens and said that India is fully capable of looking after its citizens. "We are capable of looking after our own citizen, let him worry about the security of his country's citizen," RK Singh said.

The war of words started after Shah Rukh Khan wrote a first-person account of what it means to be a Muslim post the 9/11 world. Rehman Malik demanded that India provides security to actor Shah Rukh Khan. "He (Shahrukh) is born Indian and he would like to remain Indian, but I will request the government of India to please provide him security and I would like to request all Indian brothers and sisters who are all talking against Shah Rukh that they should know he is a movie star, he is loved as a star by the people of Pakistan and he is loved by the people of India, then why to create some kind of hate, let's bring love," Malik said.

On Sunday, Jamaat-ud-Dawa founder Hafiz Saeed had also said that the actor can move to Pakistan if he didn't feel safe in India. In his interview, Khan had mentioned that he has sometimes become the inadvertent object of political leaders who choose to make him a symbol of all that they think is wrong and unpatriotic about Muslims in India.

Khan, in his essay for the special edition of Outlook Turning Points publication, on what it means to be a Khan in India, wrote, "I sometimes become the inadvertent object of political leaders who choose to make me a symbol of all that they think is wrong and unpatriotic about Muslims in India. There have been occasions when I have been accused of bearing allegiance to our neighbouring nation than my own country -- this even though I am an Indian whose father fought for the freedom of India. Rallies have been held where leaders have exhorted me to leave my home and return to what they refer to as my original homeland."

Shah Rukh Khan also wrote about his decision to make 'My Name Is Khan'. "I became so sick of being mistaken for some crazed terrorist who coincidentally carries the same last name of mine that I made a film, subtly titled My Name is Khan (and I am not a terrorist) to prove a point. Ironically, I was interrogated at the airport for hours about my last name when I was going to present the film in America for the first time."

"Of course, I politely decline each time, citing such pressing reasons as sanitation works at my house preventing me from taking the good shower that's needed before undertaking an extensive journey. I don't know how long this excuse will hold," Khan wrote.