Hyderabad:

Though the culture of Iftar parties is not new for Hyderabad and governments and the political parties have been throwing bashes during Ramadan to woo the minority community, the K Chandrasekhar Rao government has gone one step further with Telangana to celebrate Ramadan officially.

While the grand Iftar party in Hyderabad will be hosted by the Chief Secretary, similar Iftars will be organised in all the nine districts by the respective district collectors.

This is part of a Rs260 million (Dh15.06 million) bonanza, Chief Minister K Chandrsekhar Rao announced for the Muslim community on the occasion of Ramadan. While a lion’s share of the package will be spent on Iftars, he also announced various other measures, including distribution of clothes among poor members of the community for Eid-ul-Fitr marking the end of Ramadan.

Chandrasekhar Rao said the Dawat-e-Iftar will be a grand affair with 4000 people invited in Hyderabad. The state government was also inviting ambassadors of many Muslim countries including Saudi Arabia, Gulf and Arab countries, Turkey, Iran, Indonesia and Malaysia.

A committee headed by senior IPS officer and Anti-Corruption Bureau head Abdul Khayyum Khan was constituted to make the arrangements for the Iftar party and invite the envoys from New Delhi.

Chief Minister K Chandrsekhar Rao will attend the Iftar party in Hyderabad to be held at the Nizam College Grounds on July 8. The Iftar parties in the districts will be attended by ministers, local MLAs and the MPs, he told the reporters.

“This is part of our Ganga Jamni Tehzeeb”, (composite culture), the Chief Minister said. “We are creating history with these grand celebrations and state will emerge as a champion in celebrating Ramadan in the entire country”.

In addition to this, Iftar parties will also be organised by the government in 100 mosques in Hyderabad and one mosque in each of the 119 assembly constituencies across the state. Iftar parties will also be organised in all the Muslim orphanages in the state on July 5.

For the first time the state government will release a formal order sanctioning money from the treasury for these festivities.

Other sops include distribution of clothes of Rs500 to each of 195,000 poor Muslim families through the mosque committees for Eid. The government will also pay Rs1,000 to the Imam and the muezzin (official who makes the call for prayers from mosques) of each of the 5,000 mosques across the state.

Meanwhile, the opposition Congress party questioned the motives of K Chandrasekhar Rao behind officially organising iftar parties. The party leader in the Legislative Council Mohammad Ali Shabbir alleged that Chief Minister KCR was mocking the poverty of Muslims by making such announcements. “We had announced a salary of Rs5,000 for the Imams of the mosques in the past, but the Muslim Personal Law Board opposed it”, he said.

Shabbir alleged that KCR was indulging in gimmicks in view of the coming elections to Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation where Muslims hold the key. If KCR is serious about the issues of the minority, then he should order a CBI inquiry in to the killing of five Muslim under-trials by the police at Aleru.

Telangana Congress president Uttam Kumar Reddy demanded to know what happened to the promise of Chief Minister to implement 12 per cent reservations for Muslims by the month of Ramadan.