New Delhi: Moneeza Hashmi, peace activist and daughter of Pakistani poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz, was last week barred from an international media conclave hosted by the information and broadcasting ministry here after being invited.

Taken aback, the 72-year-old returned to Lahore on Saturday but refuses to let the experience eclipse her work and that of the Faiz Foundation Trust to build bridges between the people of the two countries.

"The Faiz Foundation will continue to promote peace and invite people from India; our hearts will remain open," Moneeza told The Telegraph, while saying that what happened was unfair to Pakistan as it went un-represented at the conclave.

The 15th Asia Media Summit was organised by the Asia-Pacific Institute for Broadcasting Development (AIBD), with the I&B ministry as the host by virtue of the event being held in India.

Invited, Moneeza had reached the Taj Palace Hotel on Wednesday evening, a day ahead of the start of the summit, to check in as scheduled. Hotel staff told her there was no booking in her name.

AIBD officials then told her she was being relocated to another hotel but would not be able to participate in the session she had been invited to. She is still listed on the summit's programme as one of the four speakers on "Should all good stories be commercially successful?"

No explanation was provided to her, Moneeza said, adding that her request to at least attend the sessions was also rejected.

The AIBD organised accommodation for her at the Royal Plaza hotel for four days, as earlier planned, but she decided to cut her visit short and return through Wagah.

"I come to India all the time as I have a multiple-entry, year-long visa. No one in the Indian government contacted me, but I get the impression they realised at the last minute that a Pakistani had made it to the conference," she said.

"Now I'm being told that officials in India are saying that I did not come on a conference visa. But my sister Salima and I have attended several conferences on this very visa, which has been renewed annually for years now by the Indian high commission in Islamabad."

Ironically, I&B officials had earlier on Wednesday told journalists that Pakistan would be among the participating countries.

Neither I&B officials nor their foreign ministry counterparts responded to queries on Sunday why Moneeza had been barred from an event she had been invited to.

Peace activists on both sides of the border expressed dismay. Moneeza's son Ali Hashmi tweeted: "This is your #ShiningIndia?? My 72-year-old mother, daughter of #Faiz, denied permission to participate in conference after being officially invited. #Shame."

On Sunday, Ali put out a message from the Faiz Foundation.

"The Faiz Foundation would like to reiterate our deepest respect and admiration for the democratic and secular traditions of #India. This recent short-sighted and totally undemocratic action by the govt of @narendramodi in no way diminishes our love and respect for the people of #India and our continuing hope and fervent desire for improved relations between our neighbouring countries. #Faiz belongs to everyone," it said.

Moneeza's friends shared a message she had sent some of them. In the message, she says: "Thank you for your and other friends' support. I leave it to your judgement to deal with this matter. We the Faiz family and the Faiz Foundation will continue to work for peace between our two countries. As Faiz would say, ' Lambi hai gam ki shaam magar shaam hi toh hai (long is the evening of sorrow, but it's still only the evening)'."

Last year, Kishwar Naheed, the lone Pakistani poet to make it to Jashn-e-Rekhta, a three-day celebration of Urdu in Delhi, had left midway after finding that she had been invited only as a guest and not as a participant.