The balloting for Hajj 2015 was held Thursday and 143,000 lucky Pakistanis were selected to perform Hajj this year.
Addressing a press conference on the occasion, Federal Minister for Religious Affairs, Sardar Muhammad Yousaf, said that the expenses of Hajj have been decreased to facilitate a maximum number of people this year.
The minister said that this year the government had received 2,69,368 applications from across the country of which 1,43,000 have been approved in accordance with the Hajj agreement signed between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
Sardar Yousaf said that the media played an important role in the preparation of Hajj policy and its suggestion have been given due importance.
He said that for the first time in the history of the country an online system for receiving Hajj applications has been introduced through which 1,22,6501 applications were received from Punjab, 57,812 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), 57,391 from Sindh, 15,380 from Balochistan, 2,228 from Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) and 4,455 from Gilgit Baltistan (GB).
The minister said that in accordance with the new Hajj policy applications were entertained through balloting against the process of “First come first served” adopted in the last three to four years.
He said Hajj arrangements of the last year were widely appreciated by Hujaj and no complaint was received. He added that every effort would be made to further improve things for the coming Hajj.