KARACHI: The Sindh High Court on Thursday directed the stakeholders, including federal ministry of religious affairs, ministry of foreign affairs and private travel firms, to work out a solution to the issue of biometric collection of Haj and Umrah visitors.

The SHC bench was hearing a petition filed by a religious scholar, Rao Nasir Ali Jehangir, who had moved the court against the authorities concerned seeking to get the pilgrims fingerprinted before they proceeded on their holy journey to Saudi Arabia.

The petitioner, through his counsel Advocate Nadeem Shaikh, submitted that the embassy of Saudi Arabia had relayed the decision to Islamabad and Haj and Umrah travel agencies that all visas would be activated only after biometric registration, including those of Haj and Umrah.

He said M/s Etimad (Pvt) Limited, which was supposed to collect the fingerprint data of the pilgrims, was not Pakistani but a Dubai-based company affiliated with VFS Tasheel International, where one of its directors was Indian.

Published in Dawn, February 16th, 2018