Telangana: Haj pilgrimage costs could drop by Rs 1L from next season

Hyderabad: Telangana State Haj Committee chairman, Mohammad Saleem in a press conference in Delhi on November 12 urged the centre to reduce the expenditure for the pilgrimage from the upcoming season by at least Rs 1 lakh, bringing a sigh of relief to the Haj aspirants.

Speaking to the media, Saleem said that all representatives of State Haj Committees have requested the minority affairs minister Smriti Irani to reduce the expenditure of the Haj pilgrimage from Rs 4 lakh to between Rs 2.5 lakh and Rs 3 lakh to which the minister agreed to consider their request.

The Telangana State Haj Committee had earlier requested the Central Haj Committee to increase its annual Haj quota to 7,000 and that of Andhra Pradesh to 3,000.

The Chairman said, “Earlier, each Haji could perform Haj by spending Rs 1 lakh to Rs 1.25 lakh, but since the last few years it has gone up to Rs 4 lakh. The increase in expenditure is burdening the poor and middle class. Hence, we requested the Centre to reduce it by at least Rs 1 lakh.”

Saleem further said that Haj committees would also monitor the charges collected by private operators. “If they do not follow the guidelines of the government, stringent action would be initiated against them,” he added.

The Central Haj Committee was planning to increase the annual Haj quota to 2 lakh from the current year’s quota of 75,000, hence, the State Haj Committee has requested the Centre to increase Telangana’s quota to 7,000 from the current quota of 2171 and Andhra Pradesh quota from 900 to 3,000.

The Centre has agreed to remove the age restriction for Haj pilgrims brought into force during the COVID-19 period. ”During Covid, only people below 60 years were allowed to perform Haj. Now the government has decided to allow people of all ages to perform Haj from next year,” said the chairman.

Informing on the applications for the next Haj season, Saleem said that they would accept applications from the first week of December.

The Central Haj Committee will release the new guidelines for the Haj pilgrimage in December and an application would be launched for aspiring Hajis to register for the pilgrimage.

Saleem also announced that the Telangana State Haj Committee had bagged the ‘Best Embarkation Point’ award for the year 2022-23 while expressing his gratitude towards chief minister, K Chandrashekhar Rao for extending his support to the committee.