PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government on Monday approved a proposal to award Rs10,000 monthly stipend to prayer leaders of the main mosques across the province.

Officials told Dawn that the initiative, which was likely to cost the province’s kitty about Rs3 billion per annum, was the brainchild of Chief Minister Pervez Khattak as he wanted to launch it immediately.

The decision to this effect was taken in a meeting chaired by the chief minister that was also attended by Senior Minister Inayatullah Khan, Minister for Auqaf and Religious Affairs Haji Habibur Rehman, Chief Secretary Mohammad Azam Khan and other officers.

According to a statement, the chief minister told the meeting that his government made its mind to formulate a policy with religious spirit to help the prayer leaders so that they could take care of their families.

He said that basic aim of the policy was to give the prayer leaders an enabling environment so that they could dedicate themselves to the cause of religion.

Mr Khattak directed the finance department to arrange funds for honoraria and move a summary to put on ground the new mechanism immediately.

Official says scheme to cost about Rs3 billion per annum

The statement said that the government laid down certain guiding principles for the award of Rs10,000 per month honoraria to the prayer leaders. The prayer leaders should be the citizens of Pakistan and qualified from the recognised boards of religious education to get the stipend.

Auqaf Secretary Syed Hidayat Jan told Dawn that the government formally approved the proposal and directed the department to move a summary in that regard immediately.

He said that currently they were collecting details of mosques from across the province. “So far most of the districts with the exception of Peshawar, Swat, Manshera and Upper and Lower Dir have shared data of mosques with the department. It is a huge exercise and currently we are collecting the data,” said Mr Jan.

He said that there were more than 70,000 mosques across the province, however, government would provide stipend to prayer leaders of the main mosques only. “We would set up tehsil level committees to shortlist the main mosques. These committees would be headed by the assistant commissioner level officer and would have assistant director local government department, district Khateeb and other officials as members,” said Mr Jan.

He said that it immediately it was not clear that the move would benefit how many mosques, however, tentatively they were expecting the figure to be around 20,000. “The provision of stipend is likely to cost the province about Rs3 billion per annum,” he added.

Mr Jan said that chief minister was eager about the initiative and so far about four meetings had taken place to discuss the matter. About the duration of the programme, he said that they were hoping to launch it as soon as possible in the light of the chief minister’s directives.

“This programme is going to be here at least in the remaining tenure of the incumbent government,” said Mr Jan.

He added that it would be up to the next government to carry on or discontinue the programme.

Earlier in September this year, JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman termed awarding stipend to prayer leaders a western agenda after the provincial government announced the scheme.

Published in Dawn, December 27th, 2017