August 21, 2008	Thursday	Sha'aban 18, 1429

DADU, Aug 20: Eight devotees of Qalandar Lal Shahbaz died of suffocation due to overcrowding in different parts of Sehwan and one drowned in Aral Canal on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Four bodies have been sent to the towns where they belonged, three have been buried in local graveyard and one is still lying in Edhi centre’s morgue. The devotees had come to Sehwan to attend three day Urs celebrations of Qalandar Lal Shahbaz which would start on Thursday.

In-charge of Edhi centre Ashfaq Ahmed Khushik said that Maqsood, 25, of Jhang, Pehalwan, 40, of Muzaffarabad, Khalil, 45, of Mirpurkhas, and Baba Bula, 40, of Multan, died from suffocation and their bodies had been sent to their native towns.

Thousands of people from across the country have gathered in the small town to attend the Urs. Majority of them have erected tents at different places in the town while some have rented houses for three days.

District Nazim Jamshoro Malik Asad Sikandar has gone on a 10-day leave and District Naib Nazim Abdul Hameed Buledi who is looking after affairs in his absence announced public holiday in Jamshoro on Aug 23 on account of Urs.

Mr Buledi said that special arrangements had been made to provide maximum facilities to the devotees during Urs celebrations. The district had improved drainage system and called extra sanitation staff from other taluka municipal committees to run the system in a smooth manner for three days of Urs, he said.

Hyderabad DIG Sanaullah Abbasi said that close circuit cameras would be installed in and around the shrine and at important places in the town and a control room had been set up to keep an eye on the situation. Over 1,000 additional police personnel had been called from other districts of Hyderabad region to beef up security, he added.

A devotee from Multan Muhammad Khan said that police were collecting Rs100 per vehicle as extortion money and drinking water facilities were insufficient for the thousands of people.

Akbar, another devotee from Khanewal, complained of loadshedding, which he said had multiplied devotees’ hardships.

Police and excise officials have established camps on the Indus Highway from Jamshoro to Sehwan and from Jhallo police station to Sehwan and from Dhamrah Wah to Sehwan.

The reconstruction work of Qalandar’s shrine still remains incomplete. Work on the renovation and reconstruction of the shrine had started in 1995 after the tomb of the shrine collapsed and then Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto approved a three-phased project for the shrine’s.

About 90 per cent work on phase-I and 85 per cent on phase-II had been completed when experts detected some faults in the reconstructed dome, which developed leaks during heavy rains. An inquiry has been launched into the leakage. Work on phase-III is yet to be completed.