Islamabad: The Pakistan Supreme Court has directed the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial government to start the immediate rebuilding of a Hindu temple which was set on fire by a mob in December 2020.
On December 30, 2020, an unruly crowd set fire to the Samadhi of Shri Paramhans Ji Maharaj located in Karak district’s Teri area after more than a thousand people led by some local elders of a religious party held a protest and demanded the removal of the temple, originally built before 1920.
Last month, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government had announced reconstruction of the temple, as well as a crackdown against the attackers.
During the hearing on Monday, a three-judge bench of the apex court headed by Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed also directed the province to submit a timeline for the shrine’s completion, The Express Tribune reported.
Ikram Chaudhry, lawyer for the Evacuee Trust Property Board which maintains Hindu and Sikh places of worship in Pakistan, apprised the bench that no recovery has been made so far on the temple issue.
“The government had approved 30.41 million PKR for the reconstruction of the temple,” Chaudhry told the court.
