Minister for Minority Welfare, Haj and Wakf and Municipal Administration Qamarul Islam said here on Sunday that the government has allotted two acres of land at Bajpe, near Mangalore International Airport, for building a Haj House.
Addressing presspersons here, the minister said that the construction of the Haj House would be taken up after reserving fund for it in the 2014-15 Budget. It might take two years to build it.
The Haj House provides accommodation to all Haj pilgrims. Pilgrims may offer prayers there before proceeding on the pilgrimage. According to a senior official of the Airports Authority of India, in Delhi and Mumbai Haj pilgrims were directly taken to aircraft after completing security formalities at Haj Houses. But it need not be the same in all Haj houses. The local Customs, Immigration and Central Industrial Security Force authorities would have a say on it depending on the distance between the location of the houses and parking stand of aircraft in airports.
Annually about 1,000 pilgrims — mainly from Dakshina Kannada, Udupi, Chikmagalur, Hassan and Kodagu districts — go for Haj from the airport here. Mr. Qamarul said that number of pilgrims travelling from here was likely to touch 2,000 in due course of time. The Haj House would be built to accommodate about 2,000 pilgrims.
He said that the two acres would be fenced at a cost of Rs. 3.50 lakh by the Nirmiti Kendra.
The government had sanctioned five acres near the airport at Gulbarga for Haj House. The site would be fenced for now. The construction would begin after allocation of fund in the next State Budget.
The minister said that the construction of Haj House in Bangalore was in the final stage. It would be operational for 2014-15 Haj.
Wakf properties
He said that 60 per cent to 70 per cent of survey of wakf properties in the State had been completed and the first gazette notification of the properties surveyed with authentication by the Revenue Department would be published by the end of this month.
The second gazette notification of the properties would be published in July, 2014, after completing the survey.
Information centres
Mr. Qamarul said that all the offices of the Minority Department, including wakf office and the Minority Development Corporation, in district headquarters would be housed in a single building. In the first phase the buildings would be constructed in 10 districts.
An information centre would be opened in those buildings to provide comprehensive information of the schemes of the department. The government would recruit two employees for each centre to provide information.
ULBs to be upgraded
Minister for Municipal Administration Qamarul Islam said here on Sunday that the government has proposed to upgrade 18 town municipal councils in the State to city municipal councils. In addition, 15 town panchayats would be upgraded as town municipal councils.
For now, the land near airport will be fenced by Nirmiti Kendra at a cost of Rs. 3.5 lakh
