PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly was told on Thursday that a madrassa in Nowshera district, administered by Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Sami chief Maulana Samiul Haq, has been allocated Rs300 million in the annual budget for 2016-17.

“I am proudly announcing that Darul Uloom Haqqania Nowshera will get Rs300 million to meet its annual expenditures,” said Provincial Minister Shah Farman while responding to opposition leader Maulana Lutfur Rehman’s remarks during general debates on budgetary documents.

He said the PTI-led government was not raiding and targeting religious institutions but has been cooperating and providing financial assistance to it. He claimed that the provincial government was providing financial assistance to other seminaries and mosques of the province.

When asked about such a big chunk of financial assistance to a single seminary, Minister for Religious Affairs Habibur Rehman told this scribe after the assembly session that Rs150 million would be provided in 2016-17 while the remaining amount would be given next year to the same madrassa.

“Actually Chief Minister Pervez Khattak had promised to Haqqania Madrassa’s administration financial assistance of Rs150 million which was adjusted in the Auqaf fund this year,” he said and added that he had no objection to this allocation but he was not taken into confidence in this regard.

“Darul Uloom Haqqania is one of the oldest and largest seminaries of Pakistan and it deserves financial assistance,” stated the provincial minister, who belongs to Jamaat-i-Islami.

Habibur Rehman said that about Rs50 million was allocated to Religious Affairs and Auqaf Ministry in the outgoing financial year but not a single scheme was materialised this year.

“In the first year (ADP), our ministry was allocated Rs16 million, in the second year it was Rs19 million and in the third year it was Rs50 million but not a single scheme was materialised during this period,” he said. He added that the chief minister was interested to fulfil his promise regarding financial assistance to the seminary administration.

Earlier, parliamentary party leader of Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-F Maulana Lutf-ur-Rehman said that the provincial government should stop raids and targeting religious institutions and its students.

On the request of PTI MPA Dr Haider Ali, the treasury benches also staged a walkout against what he called unscheduled and prolonged electricity loadshedding in the province.

“We condemn the unscheduled loadshedding in the entire province as protest rallies and demonstration are taking place in each and every district of the province,” he said and warned that the MPA themselves would lead protest rallies if the electricity loadshedding was not stopped in the province.