Brilliant step as India ends Haj subsidy, says will use funds to ?empower minorities

NEW DELHI: There will be no subsidy for Haj from this year, India’s minority affairs minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said today.nnAbout 3 lakh 59 thousand application have been received for Haj 2018.nnNaqvi told reporters that despite the subsidy withdrawal, a record number of 1.75 lakh Muslims will undertake the pilgrimage this year from IndiannNaqvi also said that the Saudi Arabian government has in principle agreed to allow Haj journey from India by ships and officials of the two countries will sit together to finalise the modalitiesnn”This is part of our policy to empower minorities with dignity and without appeasement,” Naqvi told reporters and cited a host of measures for the welfare of minoritiesnnEarlier this year, Naqvi had said that the Centre would abolish the subsidy for Haj pilgrims in accordance with a Supreme Court ordernn”A constitutional bench of the Supreme Court had, during the Congress regime in 2012, directed that the Haj subsidy be done away with. Hence, in the new policy, as per the recommendations of a committee, we have decided to do away with the Haj subsidy gradually,” he had said.