ISLAMABAD: The Pakistani government said on Friday it was seeking Hajj applications for limited seats still available for the aspiring pilgrims as around 70,000 Pakistanis have already reached Saudi Arabia to perform the annual pilgrimage. 

Hajj is an obligatory religious ritual for adult Muslims who are physically and financially capable of carrying it out. It involves visiting the holy cities of Makkah and Madinah at least once in a lifetime and takes place during the last month of the lunar Islamic calendar called Dhu Al-Hijjah. 

This year, Saudi Arabia reinstated Pakistan’s pre-pandemic Hajj quota of 179,210 pilgrims and scrapped the upper age limit of 65 in January. About 80,000 Pakistani pilgrims are expected to perform the pilgrimage under the government scheme this year, while the rest will be facilitated by private tour operators. 

In the wake of the dollar shortage in the South Asian country, the government returned a Hajj quota of nearly 8,000 pilgrims to the Saudi authorities but later managed to get some 1,500 back to accommodate domestic applicants. 

“[Of those 1,500,] we have 150 seats available in total, but have received only 70 applications so far,” Azizullah Khan, a Hajj policy section officer at the Pakistani religious affairs ministry, told Arab News, adding the response from the public was “slow and sluggish.” 

The ministry was struggling to fulfil the 1,500 seats that it had managed to get back from the Saudi authorities, he said. 

“Inflation and currency depreciation could be the reasons for a lackluster response from the public,” Khan said. 

The ministry has sought fresh applications on a first-come-first-served basis and the application form is available on the ministry’s website, which could be submitted either by hand or through email. 

The applicants can provide details of the cluster as well on the form if they plan to travel to Saudi Arabia in a group. 

Pakistan started the pre-Hajj flight operation to Saudi Arabia from different cities, including Karachi, Lahore and Faisalabad, on May 21 and it is expected to continue until June 21. 

In a bid to overcome the dollar shortage and fulfil the Hajj quota, Pakistan introduced a Hajj sponsorship scheme this year, allowing its overseas nationals to apply for the pilgrimage by paying in US dollars or sponsor close relatives in the country. 

However, it received a lackluster response, with only 7,000 applications against an allocated quota of 44,000. 

More than 70,000 Pakistani pilgrims have reached Saudi Arabia so far while the remaining are scheduled to reach there by the next week, according to the religious affairs ministry.