Patiala, May 24 -- Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday asserted that if he was in power during the 1971 war, he would have taken Kartapur Sahib from Pakistan before freeing 90,000 Pakistani troops.

Addressing a rally at Patiala, his first in the state for the seventh phase of Lok Sabha polls on June 1, Modi said Punjab and the Sikh community were always at the forefront of national-building efforts, even as he lambasted the current Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government over corruption and drugs trade. He called chief minister Bhagwant Mann only a kagazi CM - chief minister only on paper.

Modi brought up the emotive issue of the gurdwara in Kartarpur Sahib in Pakistan, a place sacred to Sikhs as Guru Nanak spent the last years of his life ...