ISLAMABAD: Pakistani Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar presided over a meeting on advance preparations for Hajj 2024 on Monday and ordered the formation of a reform committee to look into complaints against private Hajj companies.

Last week, Pakistan’s religious affairs ministry had asked private Hajj operators to provide suggestions to improve operations and implement new Saudi instructions regarding a reduction in the number of pilgrims for each company.

Pakistan has been assigned a quota of 179,210 pilgrims for next year’s Hajj and the country is currently pondering an early start of the Hajj process. Private tour operators have been granted 60 percent of the pilgrim’s quota, while 40 percent will travel under the government scheme.

“Prime Minister’s directs submitting a report on complaints regarding private Hajj companies and to form a reform committee for this system,” the PM’s Office said in a statement. 

“By closely monitoring private companies, it should be ensured that pilgrims passing through them do not face any kind of difficulties ... there should be no compromise on the arrangements made for the pilgrims,” the statement quoted the PM as saying.

Kakar also ordered the religious affairs ministry to submit a comprehensive report on the complaints by pilgrims regarding arrangements for Hajj 2023 and asked it to collaborate with the IT ministry to launch “a mobile application and website for facilities of pilgrims and registration of complaints.”

This year, Saudi Arabia reinstated Pakistan’s pre-pandemic Hajj quota of 179,210 pilgrims and scrapped the upper age limit of 65. About 80,000 Pakistani pilgrims performed the pilgrimage under the government scheme while the rest used private tour operators.