By Muhammad Najeeb, IANS
Islamabad : Over three thousand people offered prayers at the controversial Lal Masjid Wednesday afternoon when it was opened to public after three months of closure following Supreme Court orders.
The Lal Masjid was closed after Pakistani security forces stormed it in July to flush out armed radical Islamists hiding there. A bloody clash followed the raid that left over 200 people killed, including chief cleric of the mosque.
The court Tuesday ordered the Islamabad administration to reopen the mosque for general public and remove all barricades around it. The religious seminary, Jamia Hafsa – adjacent to the mosque – was demolished and the red-collared walls had been painted light grey.
The authorities were asked to hand over the mosque to the residents to allow them to decide how to run it.
The court asked the authorities to rebuild the Jamia Hafsa in a year and hand it over to the residents. It asked the local residents to ensure the smooth functioning and security of the mosque.
Many people could not find place inside the mosque and lined up on the roads outside to offer the midday prayers. Some female students of Jamia Hafsa had also arrived at the mosque and went back without saying prayers due to the huge crowd.
The atmosphere was calm and no one raised any slogan. People peacefully dispersed after the prayers.
The administration, in early September, tried to open the mosque but had to close it again, as several hundred male students of the nearby seminary reached there, raising slogans against President Pervez Musharraf and the government. The mosque was again closed for an indefinite period.
“We are very happy that the masjid has been opened and we’ll have the opportunity to say prayers here,” an aged Akhtar Hussain, local resident told IANS.
He said the residents of the area would hold a meeting Thursday night after isha (late night) prayers to take decision on the administration of the mosque.
The Lal Masjid was built in early 1960s. Since the nearby government quarters were painted brick red, the mosque was also collared red and named as Lal Masjid after its colour, though it has the official name as Jamia Masjid G-6.
The residents said that they would again paint it red because of its historical value. They said that the road near mosque would be named after Maulana Abdul Rashid Ghazi – the chief cleric of the mosque, who was killed by security forces during the storming.
Ghazi’s elder brother Maulana Abdul Aziz was arrested while he tried to sneak out of the mosque in a burqa. He is under arrest and facing terrorism charges. However his wife Ume-e-Hassan and daughter Amina were released on bail.