KARACHI: The Sindh government has in principle decided to start collecting Zakat according to a decision taken by Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah, and a letter is being sent to the federal government with this information, a government spokesman said on Monday.

He added that a similar request would also be made to the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP).

The strategy was decided at a meeting presided over by the CM where senior minister for finance Syed Murad Ali Shah, CM’s adviser on Zakat Dost Mohammad Rahmoo, Sindh Zakat Council chairman retired Justice Zahid Qurban Alvi and chief secretary Siddique Memon were in attendance.

Mr Memon said the Sindh government had passed the Zakat and Ushr law following the 18th constitutional amendment. Under the law, he added, the provincial government had constituted the Zakat council and the same law allowed Sindh to collect and distribute Zakat.

Secretary for inter-provincial coordination Qazi Shahid Parvez said that the legal and constitutional position of the Sindh government for the collection and distribution of Zakat was crystal clear. A committee constituted by the Council of Common Interests (CCI) in one of its meetings had decided to continue the Zakat collection and distribution mechanism till 2015.

The chief minister decided his government would collect Zakat from the current year, thus the federal government was being informed. He directed the chief secretary to write a letter to Islamabad, particularly to the CCI secretary, to inform them about the Sindh government’s formal decision.

CM Shah also ordered the chief secretary to write another letter to the SBP concerning the collection of Zakat by the provincial government. “I would suggest to you to hold a meeting with the SBP’s deputy governor to devise and finalise a mechanism for the collection of Zakat [by Sindh] and transfer the same in the account of the provincial government’s account,” he said.

The spokesman said the federal government at present gave 23.7 per cent share of its total collection of Zakat funds to Sindh.

Mr Shah also directed the Zakat council and the secretary for Zakat and Ushr to explore new means for collection of Zakat, apart from bank deductions.

He also asked senior officials to give suggestions concerning the formation of a Zakat council which represented members of the chambers of commerce and industry and people of repute from other sections of society.

Published in Dawn, January 5th, 2016