KARACHI, June 12: A lift-cum-ramp system to facilitate the access of special persons and senior citizens to the mausoleum of Quaid-i-Azam will be completed by the end of this month. According to the sources, ramps are being constructed from the ground level to the lower podium (79 feet above mean sea level) under the Rs5 million project, being implemented by the Qauid-i-Azam Mazar Management Board.

A museum displaying personal things of Mohammad Ali Jinnah and the graves of Madar-i-Millat Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah, Quaid-i-Millat Liaquat Ali Khan, his wife Ra’ana Liaquat Ali Khan, Sardar Abdul Rab Nishtar, and Noorul Amin are located on this lower podium.

The sources said that from the lower podium to the upper podium (91 feet above mean sea level) a two-door glass lift is being installed so that the senior citizens and special persons could easily reach the upper podium level.

A small ramp will be constructed at the upper podium so that people could easily enter the chamber, where a replica of the grave of the Father of the Nation is located, and offer fateha.

Responding to the Dawn queries Mohammad Arif of the QMMB, said that a special machine-room-less lift was being installed to follow the law which restricted that no construction / building should be constructed above the upper podium (91 feet above mean sea level) in a radius of 1.2 kilometres around the mausoleum.

He said that the lift’s machine would be in a pit in the ground under the lift’s steel frame and there would be no cement concrete walls as all the four sides of the lift were made of especially treated glass to make it stronger. The project would be completed by the June 30, he concluded.