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Author: Bhaskar Roy
Publication: The Times of India
Date: April 16, 2007
Introduction: Govt probe indicts corrupt Shrine Panel for sorry state of affairs at Sufi Saint's Tomb
A government-instituted inquiry has indicted members of the committee managing affairs of the famous Sufi shrine at Ajmer and called for immediate steps to end corruption and mismanagement at the dargah.
After the ministry of minority affairs received a large number of complaints about irregularities at the shrine of Moinuddin Chisti, and an NGO filed a PIL in the Delhi high court, the seven-member committee conducted an inquiry, examining documents and questioning people in Ajmer in February.
Headed by Ghayur-e-Alam with Firoz Bakht Ahmed as convener, the panel called for immediate dismissal of the present committee.
The first impression the committee members received of the upkeep of the historic shrine was an unhappy one. "The very first impression is that of dingy lanes, haphazard shops, harrying beggars... very unhygienic conditions," the committee noted in its report.
But the investigation brought to light more sordid aspects of the dargah management - money being spent without maintaining proper records, misuse of facilities, encroachment of the premises by unauthorised people and even sale of liquor in its vicinity.
The committee deplored that "no proper system existed for vouchers or papers to sanction money to the dargah committee members by the Naib Nazim". Going through the records of this senior official, the committee found that "all these years he has been issuing money to various members of the dargah committee in a manner most unprofessional".
It found that the main courtyard of the dargah had "been unlawfully and illegally occupied by the khuddam (volunteers) over the years".
Some of the committee members, the report said, stayed in the dargah complex with their families and refused to pay rent and food bills running into lakhs of rupees.
Some of the committee members 'misused' the dargah's fleet of cars and allowed indiscriminate mushrooming of shops around the premises. "The presence of such people on the dargah committee will jeopardise its management and tarnish the image of the 800-yearold globally-acclaimed Sufi shrine," the report said.
Muslim Ekta Manch, a local organisation, highlighting the unsavoury affairs at the shrine, has demanded removal of the present committee members.
"We have launched a movement to restore the glory of the shrine; if the dargah management is ready to reform the system, we will cooperate, " Manch president Shaikhzada Zulffeqar Chisti said on phone from Ajmer.
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