Gas tariff increase for mosques, minorities’ worship places withdrawn: Elahi

Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid-e-Azam (PML-Q) senior central leader and Deputy Prime Minister Chaudhry Parvez Elahi said on Tuesday that it has been decided to withdraw the increase in gas tariff for all mosques, seminaries, Imambargahs, shrines, churches and worship places of minorities.
He made this announcement during his meeting with the leaders of Ittehad Tanzeemaat-e- Madaris Pakistan in Islamabad in the light of consultations with PML-Q President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and Prime Minister (PM) Raja Parvez Ashraf. In the meeting with Parvez in the Prime Minister’s Secretariat, Advisor to the Prime Minister for Industries Muhammad Basharat Raja, Federal Secretary Petroleum and Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) chairman, Sahibzada Fazal Karim, Maulana Mohammad Qasim, Maulana Salimullah Khan, Mufti Muneebur Rahman, Maulana Qari Muhammad Hanif Jullundhry, Maulana Abdul Maalik, Hafiz Ammar Yasir, Maulana Muhammad Younis Butt, Dr Saeed Mohammad Najafi, Maulana Aneesul Hasnain Khan and other religious scholars were also present in the meeting.
The religious scholars demanded that the OGRA through a notification on September 22, 2012 had excluded mosques, seminaries, Imambargahs, shrines and worship places of minorities from domestic consumers’ category and included them in the special category and had fixed new slabs of gas tariff, as a result of which the price of natural gas for these places of worship and institutions had almost reached the level of commercial consumers. In addition, the minimum monthly bill of Rs 3,600 had been made compulsory and fees for new connections had also been increased from Rs 3,000 to Rs 30,000. All of these decisions made by the OGRA amounted to grave injustice, the religious scholars added.
Meanwhile, the deputy PM said that they respected the religious scholars, adding that seminaries were the biggest Non-Government Organisations (NGOs) in the world and to solve their problems was equivalent to worshipping and serving Allah. He said that the increase in gas tariff had been withdrawn, while gas would be supplied to all mosques, seminaries, imambargahs, shrines, churches and other places of worship of the minorities on tariff for domestic consumers.
He said that in this regard he had consulted Shujaat and the PM.
The religious scholars further demanded that these were purely welfare, charitable and non-profit institutions and those benefitting from these institutions included male and female students and other people belonging to the very poor segments of the society. Therefore, the slab system should also be abolished altogether, they added. In response to this, Parvez said that for solving this problem, he would shortly convene another meeting in this regard.