ISLAMABAD – The Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony has announced the procedure for biometric verification of pilgrims who will be performing the Hajj this year.
The ministry has announced that the pilgrims can perform the verification through a mobile application from the comfort of their homes.
For the biometric verification – which is essential for performing Hajj – the pilgrims should install the Saudi Visa Bio App on their smartphone which is available both for Android users and iPhone users on their respective app stores.
After entering the credentials like e-mail address, the pilgrims would be taken to the next step which includes verification of e-mail address and scanning the passport.
The pilgrims would also be asked to capture their profile picture after which their biometric verification would be done and in case of any issues, pilgrims can contact the following numbers:
(+92) 51 9205696, 9216980, 9216981, 9216982.
The complete step-by-step guide in this regard can be seen here.
It is to be clarified that the ministry has exempted the elderly who are above 80 years of age as well as the children less than 6 years of age from the biometric verification.
The ministry has also directed that the pilgrims should deposit the attested email along with the passport to the relevant bank by February 26th. For overseas Pakistanis, the relevant officer should be forwarded the documents through e-mail.
It bears mentioning that the government has already conducted balloting for the upcoming Hajj and had also allowed those who had performed Hajj in the last 5 years to perform the Hajj scheduled in June this year.
The authorities have introduced the Short Hajj package for the pilgrims while the Sponsorship Scheme is also valid for this year as well.
As far as the Long Hajj is concerned, it would encompass 38-42 days with 8 days stay in Medinah and those flying from the South region i.e. Karachi, and Sukkhur would have to pay Rs 10,65,000 while those from other cities i.e. Islamabad, Lahore, Peshawar, Multan, Sialkot, Faisalabad would pay Rs 10,75,000.
For Sponsorship scheme applicants, the cost is $3765 for the South Region while it is $ 3800 for the North Region for those opting for the Long Hajj package.
For the Short Hajj package, the cost for regular Hajj applicants is Rs 11,40,000 for the South region while the cost is Rs 11,50,000 for the North region; the Hajj would continue for 20-25 days under this scheme.
For the Sponsorship Scheme, the cost for Short Hajj is $ 4015 USD for the South region and $ 4050 for North region.
The government had also sought the support of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to launch awareness campaigns to attract more and more applicants though the inflation in the country is visibly discouraging Muslims from applying for the spiritual journey.
