After facing severe criticism in India and Malaysia for accelerating the spread of the coronavirus COVID-19, Islamic religious group Tableeghi Jamaat is now facing flak in Pakistan for organising its annual meeting at Punjab's Raiwind Markaz in March despite opposition by the local government.


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Punjab Special Branch has said in a report that the religious congregation was attended by around 70,000 to 80,000 Jamaat members at the Raiwind Markaz on March 10. Jamaat’s management, however, had claimed that the meeting was attended by over 250,000 people.


Dawn reported that 3,000 participants had arrived from 40 countries, including the US, England and the Philippines, and they were stuck in Pakistan after the government halted all international flights when coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic situation started to get worse.


City Raiwind, which has a population of around 200,000, has been placed under total lockdown after several Tableeghi Jamaat members tested positive for the deadly virus.


Talking to Dawn, Saddar Division SP (Operations) Syed Ghazanfar said that in first week of March, the Lahore police had tried to convince the Jamaat people to cancel the event due to the outbreak of the virus in China.


“Lahore Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) Zulfiqar Hameed held meetings with the top admin officials of the Jamaat to engage them when reports emerged that thousands of its members are attending annual event,” said Ghazanfar.


As the Jamaat management refused to pay any heed to the instructions of local administration and started gathering for the congregation, the Lahore Division commissioner and the DIG Operations went to Raiwind Markaz to hold another round of dialogues with the management.


“We kept the top management of the Tableeghi Jamaat engaged and finally they cut the six-day event short to three days,” said Ghaznafar.


According to Ghaznafar, majority of attendees returned to their homes on March 13 but around 5,000, including 3,000, foreigners remained in Markaz which was later declared a quarantine centre.


In Punjab, the health authorities in Punjab have slammed the Tableegi Jamaat members for the rising coronavirus cases in the region, saying that they were 'careless' in their approach and did not follow the advice of the government.


Talking to Dawn, a senior health official says the repeated requests were made by them to Tableeghi Jamaat management to curb its activities in order to curb the spread of virus in the country.


It is to be noted that over 10,000 people, who had attended the Tableeghi Jamaat event, are currently quarantined in all 36 districts of Punjab.