PESHAWAR, Sept 4: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly was informed on Tuesday that police had arrested an Afghan cleric on the charges of instigating his students to burn a religious book containing Ahadith in Lower Dir district.

Speaking on a call attention notice, Law Minister Arshad Abdullah told the house that Maulvi Zaibullah, who provoked his students, belonged to Afghanistan and had been running a seminary, Al Jamia Arabia. He said that a case had been registered against the cleric under Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act.

The minister said that according to police reports, the cleric was receiving funds from Kuwait. He said that the incident of burning Fazail-i-Aamal, a book containing volume of authentic Ahadith, took place in Samer Bagh area on August 15. Police interrogated students of the seminary who were involved in the desecration of the religious book, he added.

“The students told police that Maulvi Zaibullah instigated them to burn the book,” he said, adding that the Maulvi was being interrogated.

Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal lawmaker Hafiz Akhtar Ali took up the issue and demanded of the government to take strict action against those elements who were involved in the incident. He said that some elements were promoting sectarian tension in the area.

Minister for Livestock Hidayatullah Khan and independent MPA Khalifa Abdul Qayum supported the mover.

It may be recalled that the provincial government had issued directives to the police about two years ago to arrest Afghan clerics and prayer leaders across the province and deport them to Afghanistan. However, Afghan clerics have been running seminaries and preaching in urban and rural areas.

Replying to a call attention notice moved by MPA Javaid Abbasi concerning delay in work on Hazara Expressway, Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain said that the National Highway Authority would soon start work on the project.

He said that land was being acquired for the highway and the government had paid Rs1.2 billion to the landowners while Rs400 million would be released in next two weeks.

He said that tenders of the project would be floated within two months and work on the 22-kilometres strip of the highway from Hassanabdal to Havelian would be completed in the first phase. Federal Minister Arbab Alamgir Khan was also present in the Speaker’s gallery when the issue was raised.

Mr Abbasi said that work on the project was launched about six years ago, but the NHA could not complete the land acquisition process. He said that normally the journey from Hassanabdal to Abbottabad took an hour, but now the time had increased to three hours. He complained that the federal government was delaying work on the project, which required roughly Rs8 billion.

The MPA said that the Asian Development Bank had agreed to finance the project if the federal government provided money for land acquisition. He said that millions of people of five districts of Hazara were suffering due to delay in work.

Speaker Kiramatullah Chagharmatti said that Mr Alamgir and senior NHA officials would brief the lawmakers from Hazara about the latest position of the project.

Replying to a call attention notice, the information minister said that the government would declare Tanawal area as new district of Hazara division after completion of the upcoming general census.

He said that the proposed district would not disturb people of Abbottabad and Haripur districts and no decision would be taken against the wishes of local population. He said that elders of Tanoli tribe had demanded of the chief minister to declare Tanawal as new district in July last. Earlier, the provincial government had declared Kala Dhaka area of Hazara as new district.