KARACHI, Jan 11: As the sun rose on Thursday morning, thousands of people started arriving at the shrine of the eighth-century mystic, Syed Abdullah Shah Ghazi, to pay homage at the start of his 1276th Urs in Clifton.

His anniversary is observed from 20 to 23 Zilhajj. This year it fell on January 11.

The visitors and devotees who throng the shrine are overwhelmingly men belonging to all ethnicities and sects mixing freely here. The poor and the rich with no difference of cast or creed come here with respect and love for the saint and go up to the shrine, located on a hillock near the coast.

Food stalls, bonfires, stereo-players, langar deg, roses, shrouds of cloth inscribed with Quranic verses, groups of faqirs and malangs, and others make up the congregation that rocks the posh locality with Qawwali, Naat Khwani and Milad for three days every year.

Donations paid by devotees are managed by the Auqaf department. The day-to-day affairs of this shrine are run by the Auqaf department which took over its management in 1963. Those who don’t trust the Auqaf prefer to give alms themselves or bear the expenditure of feeding the thousands that congregate.

Devotees who come here often swear that the shrine offers spiritual sustenance. It is a bond that grows with the passage of time, they explain.

“Nobody returns empty-handed,” said an old man wearing a green cloak sitting on the stairs. This was Manzoor Hussain, who said he was a Jharukash (sweeper) of the shrine. He said, “sweeping is a sacred job and I love to sweep the floors of the shrine, as I believe that it cleans my soul and gives purity to my heart.”

He narrated the history of how Abdullah Shah Ghazi came to this coastal belt in the Umayyad dynasty when the rulers were haunted with his growing popularity among the masses. Along with many of his followers, he was martyred here around 768 AD but his message of ‘peace within and with all’ keeps spreading. The aged devotee said the shrine offers hope to hopeless, food to the starving, livelihood to many, and a spiritual satisfaction to the pious.

Many devotees who visit the shrine often said the Auqaf department officials looking after its affairs had stuck a rich vein. However, the officials say they can account for every penny collected. “There are 14 boxes put up at different spots in the shrine for donations. We collect around Rs80 million every year on average,” said manager of the shrine, Muhammad Nusrat Khan of Auqaf department.

He was happy that the spacious land beside the shrine was being turned into a parking lot. “This would not only ease traffic flow on the road but also help curb the presence of drug addicts and anti-social elements who associate with them,” he remarked.

He said programmes like Naat Khawani, Milad and Qawali had been planned for the three days. The number of visitors would grow with every hour.

Around 11am, the Urs was formally inaugurated by Sindh Governor Ishratul Ibad. Heavy contingent of police, camps of Auqaf Department including the one for first aid, two fire tenders and emergency control cell set up by the city government and the KESC vehicles with stand-by generators welcome one to the shrine.