Pakistan will face "ferocious" protests when they play in the Champions Trophy cricket tournament next week in India, a right-wing Hindu leader warned Tuesday.

"Our opposition will be swift and ferocious if Pakistan dare to play on Indian soil," Jai Bhagwan Goyal, president of the New Delhi chapter of the Shiv Sena, told AFP.

Pakistan play their opening match in the Rajasthan city of Jaipur on October 17. They take on New Zealand in Mohali on October 25 and South Africa at the same Punjab stadium two days later.

"Pitches can again be dug up ... Many things can happen which we will not disclose now as it will alert the security agencies," Goyal said in an interview.

"But whatever we do it will be a powerful and very visible protest," he added.

Goyal demanded New Delhi halt Pakistan's participation in the 10-nation tournament which ends November 5 with the final in the Shiv Sena bastion of Mumbai, formerly Bombay.

His followers dug up New Delhi's Ferozeshah Kotla ground in 1999, eight years after Sena men damaged the Mumbai's Wankhede Stadium to protest the Pakistani cricket team's presence in India.

The Hindu leader warned that Sena's regional units in Jaipur as well as in Punjab state, were "committed and ready."

Goyal said the Sena's protest followed a public statement by the Mumbai police chief that Pakistan spy agency, Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), masterminded the July 7 attacks that killed 186 people and left 800 others wounded aboard commuter trains.

"Even Afghan President Hamid Karzai accuses Islamabad of helping the Taliban ... Pakistan is a hub of terror and we do not want anything to do with that country," he said.

"We demand New Delhi call off Pakistan's participation in this tournament to express its opposition to terrorism."

The government has said it will reinforce security at venues where Pakistan plays.

India and Pakistan, which have fought three wars since 1947, suspended peace talks after the Mumbai blasts. The negotiations are set to resume on the back of a pledge by Islamabad that it will help New Delhi in its fight against terrorism.

The Sena was at the forefront of a campaign that saw the Babri mosque in Uttar Pradesh razed by tens of thousands of Hindu zealots in 1992, triggering sectarian violence that left 2,000 people, mostly Muslims, dead.

The group, founded in 1966, draws inspirations from warrior king Shivaji who fought Mughal invaders.

(Article: Copyright © 2006 AFP)