Letter to ministry: Stop Met predictions on moon sighting: Mufti Muneeb

ISLAMABAD: Chairman of the Ruet-i-Hilal Committee (RHC) Mufti Muneebur Rehman wrote on Wednesday a letter to the Ministry of Religious Affairs, urging it to restrain the Met Office from making predictions about moon sighting to avert confusion.

A senior official in the ministry told The Express Tribune on condition of anonymity that Mufti Rehman wrote the letter after a controversy was created last month when he (Muneeb) was addressing a press conference over Eidul Fitr moon sighting.

The committee is scheduled to sit in Karachi on September 2, for sighting the Zilhaj moon, which will set the date for the Eidul Azha. The official said that the letter had also been forwarded to the Met Office, asking the DG to avoid making such predictions before the moon sighting was finalized by the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee.

The ministry has already prepared a draft to reform the body and it will be submitted soon in Parliament.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 1^st, 2016.