Daily Times

PESHAWAR: Assuring protection to worship places of minorities located in Kashmir Colony Peshawar, Auqaf Department Deputy Administrator Asif Khan has said that no plaza or building construction would be allowed on the Hindu temples or Sikh gurdwaras.

Addressing a news conference at the press club on Saturday, he said that the department had sealed three Hindu temples and a Sikh gurdwara in the concerned colony, as some elements wanted to politicise the issue.

Asif said that the Auqaf Department was the custodian of all minorities’ religious places, therefore had sealed Hindu and Sikh worship places to avoid raising the issue on international level.

Accompanied by Advocate Moazzam Butt, Minorities Commission Pakistan Chairman Juniad Saqib, Pakistan Human Rights Commission Media Advisor Shanan, Sarafa Bazaar President Aurangzeb and Kashmir Colony councillor Tahir, he maintained that as a consequence of partition in 1947, many people migrated to Kashmir Colony and settled there without damaging a single brick of these religious places.

He informed that the concerned area consists on 31 marlas and 268 square feet while around 12 families were living there, adding that if minorities’ community wanted demolition of worship places, then they would be compensated properly.

“When I read about this in a newspaper, I immediately met Peshawar additional commissioner and sealed the area temporary so the issue could not become an international news,” he said, adding that no one had the right to topple the minorities’ religious places while the Auqaf Department could start construction by adopting legal means.

Moazam Bhutt on the occasion said that the Auqaf Department had assured the protection of temples and gurdwaras, therefore nobody had the right to damage these places. He added that an official notification had been issued in this regard and he would produce that notification in Peshawar High Court on July 4.