ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony said Monday that those performing Haj next year would not need to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, the ministry said: \u201cThe condition for corona[virus] vaccine has been abolished. Haj pilgrims do not need to submit their coronavirus [vaccination] certificates.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Saudi authorities revoked major restrictions this year in June for the Haj pilgrimage, which returned to its maximum capacity for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Around 2 million people gathered at Islam\u2019s holiest site to perform the pilgrimage after the Saudi authorities invited people from across the globe following the abolishment of curbs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Over 2.4 million performed the pilgrimage in 2019, while in 2020, due to the curbs imposed because of coronavirus lockdowns, Saudi Arabia restricted the attendance to a few thousand citizens and residents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In 2022, around 900,000 were able to perform Haj after the Saudi authorities allowed limited numbers of foreign pilgrims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Ministry of Religious Affairs on November 27 opened the registration for Haj 2024 under the government scheme and the process is set to continue till December 12.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The applications can be submitted on a passport valid till December 16, 2024, and the Haj application can also be processed on a passport application token.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The ministry\u2019s spokesperson said about 89,605 Pakistanis will perform Haj under the government scheme next year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Balloting will be conducted if more than the prescribed number of applications are received.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For the first time, women will have the opportunity to undertake the sacred journey without the traditional requirement of a male companion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Under the sponsorship scheme, 25,000 seats will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony said Monday that those performing Haj next year would not need to show proof of COVID-19 vaccination. In a statement on X, formerly Twitter, the ministry said: \u201cThe condition for corona[virus] vaccine has been abolished. Haj pilgrims do not need to submit their coronavirus [vaccination] certificates.\u201d The Saudi authorities revoked major restrictions this year in June for the Haj pilgrimage, which returned to its maximum capacity for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic. Around 2 million people gathered at Islam\u2019s…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-300","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-pakistan"],"gutentor_comment":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":301,"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300\/revisions\/301"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/awamimission.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}