KOHAT, Sept 23: A religious scholar of tribal area has issued a decree allowing the cultivation of poppy to be used as a weapon against the West.

The decree issued on Friday in South Waziristan Agency, south west of here, said: “The cultivation of poppy is not prohibited in the prevailing conditions in the region and money thus earned can be spent on the construction of mosques, seminaries, funding of Jehad, performing of Haj, giving alms and buying generators to fetch water because electricity has been cut off by the government”.

The decree which is supported by Islamic references is written by Maulana Riaz Mohammad Wazir of Dana, a border town in the South Waziristan Agency, in response to the queries of the local farmers who wanted to cultivate poppy in this season to meet their day-to-day expenses.

The decree says that there is no provision of taxes in Islam, but even then the government has levied tax on food items, fruits, passports, national identity cards, resident certificates, telephone and education. “It is un-Islamic and unfair. We know that the west is afraid of the drugs and we will use this weapon against them”, it states.

The people had already ploughed a vast area for poppy cultivation in Wana, Azam Warsak, Dana, Bermal and inaccessible areas towards north and west. Haji Bakhta Jan, a local farmer and elder of the Sarkikhel tribe told Dawn by telephone that they normally migrate to down country to escape harsh winter and snowfall but this year they would stay back to look after the fields of poppy which require great attention and care.

The Taliban had banned poppy and brought its cultivation to almost zero but farmers reverted to growing the crop following the change of regime in Kabul.

Haji Rehmatullah, who prepared his field this year for the crop, said he had purchased the seed from Jalalabad, eastern province of Afghanistan for Rs180 per kilogram. He is expecting eight kilograms of opium worth half a million rupees from a small land of 600X600 feet.