LAHORE, March 20: The Chief Minister Inspection Team on Thursday held the auqaf department responsible for the theft of the slippers of the Holy Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him).

The CMIT conducted an inquiry into the theft of the holy slippers on the order of Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi. A pair of the holy slippers was stolen from the Badshahi Mosque in July last year.

In its inquiry, the CMIT found that the auqaf department did not take enough measures to protect the holy relics at the mosque.

The Badshahi Mosque has been under the auqaf department’s control since 1961. To protect it’s 27 relics, the department deputed a daily-wage security guard. The inquiry team suggested that there should be at least three guards from rangers employed on regular basis to protect the relics.

It also recommended that Religious Affairs Director Tahir Raza Bokhari should be transferred and posted to the Islamic Research Institute, where he should serve for at least a year. “It will be in the interest of the department as well as for him,” the team added.

The inquiry team, however, found the sacked employees, assistant receptionist Fahim Siddiqi, a daily wager, and watchman Arshad Mahmood innocent.

Rejecting the ulema’s request to appoint ISI or FBI officials for a separate inquiry, it suggested that the police team should be allowed to continue its work. The police team has failed to find any clue so far.

The CMIT report said the allegation levelled by Badshahi Mosque’s former Khateeb Maulana Ali Asghar Abbasi that the auqaf secretary, the director religious affairs and the Punjab archaeology director were involved in the sale of the holy slippers to Brunei for Rs50 million was baseless.

It, however, confirmed that a delegation of muftis from Brunei had visited Lahore in July 2000, and took “One Asa and a pair of holy slippers” from the Badshahi Mosque with the permission of President Gen Pervez Musharraf, but they had returned those in Aug 2001.

According to the CMIT, the information provided by former auqaf minister Ghulam Sarwar Qadri that the holy slippers would be recovered from London was false.

Officials sources in the CM Secretariat told Dawn that Mr Qadri provided the information so that the government could send him to London to investigate the matter. — Zulqernain Tahir