JuD opposed to state within state, any parallel system: Hafiz Saeed

LAHORE: Hafiz Saeed Ahmad has said his party, Jamatud Dawa (JuD), has always been opposed to any state within state or a parallel governance system in the country, and it is being defamed in the name of Sharia courts under a planned conspiracy.

In an interview with the correspondent, he said Jang and Geo do responsible journalism, and “I invite them to visit Masjid Qadsiya in Lahore to see for themselves if there is any court working there or only an arbitration council”.

Clarifying the JuD position on the Sharia courts issue, Hafiz Saeed said “our arbitration councils accept only those cases involving family disputes in which both parties agree on arbitration by the councils, and 95 per cent of such cases are decided according to Quran and Sunnah”.  Without naming anyone, Hafiz Saeed said some relatives of an MNA from Lahore had been running a dispute with another party over the payment of ‘diyat’. The JuD arbitration council resolved the issue in accordance with Quran and Sunnah, which was accepted by both parties, he added.

Hafiz Saeed said the JuD arbitration council had been working for the past 22 years. Didn’t the media know about it earlier, asked the JuD chief. He said the person, Khalid Saeed property dealer, who levelled allegations against the JuD, is a fraud and a liar, and cases have been registered against him at various police stations including Gulshan-e-Iqbal, Old Anarkali, Millat Park, Samanabad, and Sarwar Road etc. He said that man owe crores of rupees to different people. Instead of paying them their money, he fabricated a fake summons and defamed the JuD through it. He said the summons he provided to the media should be thoroughly investigated, as it had no link with his organisation at all.

Hafiz Saeed said, “We believe in the Constitution and laws of the land and do not want to run any parallel system.”

He said the government has weakened its case by registering an FIR in Gujranwala regarding Pathankot issue and implicated a Pakistani in the case unnecessarily. He said when Kashmiri organisations had already claimed responsibility for the Pathankot incident, then what was the link of Pakistan or Masood Azhar with it? He said issuing warrants for Masood Azhar and others by India was another conspiracy to defame Pakistan. He said if China had not vetoed Indian resolution in the United Nations, India would have got declared Masood Azhar an international terrorist.

He suggested that the Pakistani authorities should fight their case about the arrest of Indian spy in the country at the international forums in a better way.