DADU: Former prime minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf has said that construction work on the shrine of Hazrat Lal Shahbaz Qalandar has not completed for the past 20 years and urged the federal and provincial governments to ensure early completion of the project.

The Pakistan Peoples Party leader expressed these views while talking to journalists in the Sehwan city after laying a wreath and offering Fateha at the shrine as the three-day Urs celebrations concluded on Saturday. Hundreds of thousands devotees of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar visited the shrine on 764th Urs.

Mr Ashraf said the devotees had been facing hardships due to major delays in the completion of construction work. He said the situation was distressing and urged the federal and provincial authorities to get the work done at the earliest.

Custodian of the shrine of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar Syed Wali Mohammad Shah said the pending work reflected the government’s inefficiency and negligence. He said substandard material was used for shrine’s construction with the result that rainwater dripped down the walls and through roof leaks in the main tombs. He said no officer or contractor involved in the substandard construction of the shrine had been punished so far.

The shrine custodian also said that due to political interference, influential persons had twice received millions of rupees in compensation for the properties demolished in the shrine vicinity yet they illegally occupied the shrine property.

The custodian of the shrine of Bodla Bahar, Akhtar Hussain Shah Naqvi, said the government, area people and their elected representatives had not paid proper attention to the construction work at Lal Shahbaz Qalandar shrine. Tourists and devotees from across the world who visited the shrine every year got the wrong message that the authorities were not interested in completing the work, he said.

Literary conference

Earlier, academicians and scholars from different parts of Sindh and Balochistan attended a literary conference organised by the Sindh culture department in connection with the Urs of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar at Shahbaz Auditorium, Sehwan.

At the conference, which was presided over by vice chancellor of Turbat University Dr Abdul Razak Sabir, speakers highlighted the need for conducting research studies on the teachings and life of the Sufi saint.

Dr Khizer Noshai, Dr Nawaz Ali Shook, Dr Makhmoor Bukhari, Dr Zainat Sana, Dr Maqbool, Nazeer Hayat, Anwar Azad Kandhro and other scholars and literary figures also spoke at the conference.

They called for the establishment of a research centre in Sehwan, holding of international conference on the Sufi saint, studying his life and teachings and publication of at least one well-researched book on Lal Shahbaz Qalandar in Sindhi language.

Published in Dawn, May 29th, 2016