ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Friday rejected Indian allegations that a century-old Hindu temple in its eastern Punjab province had been vandalized, saying the structure was damaged by torrential rains and authorities had begun steps to restore it.

The dispute centers on a Hindu temple in Siraj village in Pakistan’s Narowal district, around 130 km from Lahore, which was destroyed last month. Pakistani minority rights activists allege it was deliberately razed to facilitate the expansion of an adjoining Islamic seminary, while authorities maintain it collapsed following heavy rainfall.

India’s foreign ministry this week condemned what it described as the destruction of the historic temple and called on Pakistan to conduct an investigation and restore the place of worship.

“We categorically reject the false and politically motivated assertions made by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs regarding the Hindu temple at Adda Siraj, Narowal,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Sajjad Haider Khan said in a statement.

“The temple’s structure was damaged on 21 July 2026 due to torrential rains. The local authorities have already surveyed the rain damage and initiated steps for the restoration of the building.”

The FO accused New Delhi of distorting the incident and in turn criticized India’s treatment of religious minorities.

“Such deliberate distortion of facts cannot distract attention from India’s abysmal record of systematic persecution of minorities and state-sponsored attacks against their places of worship,” Khan said.

Pakistan’s Punjab provincial government has also backed the rain-damage account and said it was committed to restoring the structure.

The temple is believed to be more than a century old. Iftikhar Rana, an official of Pakistan’s Evacuee Trust Property Board, which manages properties left behind by Hindus and Sikhs who migrated to India following the 1947 partition of the subcontinent, previously said the structure was between 100 and 125 years old.

Pakistan’s account has been disputed domestically by the Pakistan Masiha Millat Party, a minority rights group, which alleges a group of people deliberately demolished the temple and removed bricks, metal fittings and other material from the site to facilitate the expansion of an adjoining seminary.

The rights group has called for the temple to be reconstructed and for greater protection of Hindu, Sikh and Christian places of worship.

Relations between nuclear-armed neighbors India and Pakistan have historically been strained by territorial disputes, militancy accusations and periodic military confrontations, while the treatment of religious minorities has also frequently become a source of diplomatic recrimination between the two countries.