Delay in Haj policy announcement perturbs aspirants

LAHORE: Thousands of aspirants for performing Haj in 2015 have been worriedly contacting scheduled banks for over one month for obtaining application forms which have been denied to them because the government was yet to announce the Haj policy for the current year.
According to sources, this year’s Haj policy is being subjected to some major changes for which it has been awaiting final approval. But neither the concerned ministry nor the Cabinet Division was able to give it go-ahead, an official of Haj minister told The News, requesting not to be named.
The unusual delay in announcement of government’s Haj policy, which was scheduled to be announced by the end of March 2015, has created panic among Haj aspirants who have been contacting the concerned ministry and Haj Directorate, besides the scheduled banks for obtaining the application forms, but never given any satisfactory answer as to when the policy would be announced. The bank officials have been directed by the government to fill up the application forms themselves to prevent the errors, but the bank staff was unable to either issue or fill up the forms in the absence of Haj policy which provides the figure of Haj expenses and relevant conditions.
The official Haj scheme seats are the most sought after among the middle and poor classes in the country since the Haj expenses under official category are much less than those under private Haj scheme, and this year the expenses are expected to further reduce under the directive of the prime minister.
One of the major reasons the Haj policy has been subjected to approval and detailed discussion among cabinet was that the government has decided to hold balloting for successful applicants, a practice which has been suspended for the past many years by former Haj Minister Khursheed Shah, sources said. The government has been following a policy of first come first served, instead.
The decision of holding balloting drew objections because it will be detrimental for those applicants who were not selected for Haj last year. Under the government policy the names of unsuccessful applicants are automatically finalized for next year. Besides, the proposed reduction of Haj fare in the PIA was yet to be settled since the PIA management has reportedly raised some objections to it.
Besides, the aspirants of official Haj scheme, the applicants of private Haj scheme are also suffering since the private Haj operators have also been waiting to declare their rates which are fixed with respect to the official rates. A private Haj operator told The News that they were also under immense pressure by the clients to declare their rates for different packages but it could not be done so far because of the delay in official Haj policy. Several attempts to contact the federal minister for Haj affairs, Sardar Muhammad Yusuf were made to have his version on the matter but he was not available.