New Delhi, Dec. 16: India today said the remarks of Pakistan’s permanent UN representative seeking to link the Deoband Islamic seminary in India to jihadis in Pakistan were “regrettable”.

“Statements by the Pakistani permanent representative (Abdullah Hussain Haroon) are indeed regrettable,” Vishnu Prakash, the external affairs ministry spokesperson, said. “The Dar-ul Uloom Deoband is one of our highly respected institutions of Islamic learning,” he said, referring to the centre in western Uttar Pradesh that is one of the oldest in the world.

In his speech, Haroon had said: “It is for the clerics in Deoband, who wield great influence in the NWFP territories of Pakistan and in Federally Administered Tribal Areas, to come to Pakistan, get together and embed, offer a fatwa in Pakistan against suicide bombings and killings of Muslims in Pakistan as well as in India.”

The Dar-ul Uloom said it had no sway in Taliban-controlled areas and that “controlling jihadis in their (Pakistan’s) territory is their business, not ours”. The vice-rector of the seminary, Abdul Khalique Madrasi, said: “Our fatwa applies to the whole world, there is no need to issue a new one.”

Prakash said the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind had complained to the ministry on the matter.

The Jamiat, an organisation of leading Muslim clerics mainly from Deoband, was founded in 1866 and opposed the two-nation theory that became the basis of the creation of Pakistan.

The clerics have protested “the language used and aspersions cast” in the Pakistani diplomat’s statement at the UN Security Council during the debate on threats to international peace and security on December 9, the spokesperson said.

“It was pointed out that this was a shameful attempt to deflect attention from the real culprits (of the Mumbai terror attacks).

“It is understood that the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind has sent protest letters to the Pakistan high commissioner in New Delhi as well as to the United Nations secretary-general,” Prakash added.