Date: 02.03.10
Source: The Daily Star
Govt To
Buy Makkah Land
Plans to build permanent
homes for 60,000 Bangladeshi hajj pilgrims
The government will purchase land in Makkah to
build houses with a capacity of 60,000 people in efforts to mitigate the
accommodation problem Bangladeshi pilgrims face during hajj in
State Minister for Religious Affairs Shahjahan
Miah yesterday told the House, "My ministry is taking help from the
foreign ministry to purchase the land for the permanent Bangladesh Hajj
mission."
Replying to lawmakers' queries on a block
allocation against MPs, the state minister said the government in the current
fiscal year has an allocation of around Tk 4 crore for lawmakers to carry out
the task of refurbishing and repairing mosques and temples across the country.
He said 300 lawmakers will get Tk 1 lakh each for
refurbishing and repairing mosques and Tk 20,000 for temples in their
constituencies. Tk 50,000 was allocated for mosques and Tk 15,000 for temples
in each of 45 reserved seats for women, he added.
The state minister also placed a policy for
disbursement of the allocated money. According to the policy, a committee
comprising upazila-level government officials might be formed to monitor and
evaluate the grants given to the respective upazila.
The proposed six-member committee chaired by the
upazila nirbahi officer (UNO) offers only one post for local government
representative who will be a senior union parishad chairman.
It, however, did not have provision for inclusion
of representatives from upazila parishads and municipalities.
In response to another query, the state minister
said there were around 2.50 lakh mosques in the country according to an Islamic
Foundation survey conducted in 2008.
The number of temples is about 23,000 as per the
information provided by district administration, he added.