Hajj quota issue filed to court by four groups

A case has been filed to court, regarding the rejection of the proposals submitted by four groups to the Islamic Ministry requesting for the permit to take people to Hajj this year.

Lawyer Areef Ahmed Naseer, who will represent Al Manaasik Group, Al Fat’h Group, Safaa Group and Classic Hajj Group in court, said that the first hearing for this case had been scheduled for today.

Areef said that this case was filed in relation to the Islamic Ministry’s decision not to evaluate the proposals submitted by the aforementioned groups after accepting them. He said that the court will be asked to declare that this decision by the ministry was against the regulation on taking people to Hajj.

Permanent Secretary at the Islamic Ministry, Mohamed Didi said today that six proposals were not evaluated because they were not submitted in accordance with Article 21 of the relevant regulation.

“Article 21 (a) of the regulation states that the proposal can only be accepted if delivered by a person, and that the person who delivers the proposal should be carrying his identity card and the company’s documents. The ministry accepted the proposals without these documents; but the regulation states that proposals submitted without these documents should not be accepted. So the ministry made a mistake, but legal counsellors have said that the regulation must be followed,” he said.

Seventeen companies submitted proposals for taking people to Hajj, out of which two companies were rejected immediately for failing to meet the requirements.

Out of the companies that requested for Hajj quotas, only eight were given the permit to take people to Hajj.

The quotas given to the eight companies are now filled up, resulting in complaints by the public.

While 874 of the 1,000 slots granted to the Maldives by Saudi Arabia this year were distributed amongst the eight qualified companies, the remaining 126 slots are reserved for the people who were swindled out of large sums of money and could not go for Hajj last year. Last year, Maleesha Hajj Group fraudulently collected MVR 11.9 million from 175 people.