Central Ruet-i-Hilal Committee meets today for moon sighting

ISLAMABAD: Controversy over moon-sighting couldn’t be put to an end this year as Eidul Fitr  is being celebrated in some parts of the Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa province today after Masjid Qasim Ali Khan announced to have sighted the Shawwal moon on Saturday evening.

However, a meeting of Central Ruet-i-Hilal Committee to sight the Shawwal crescent will be convened at Islamabad with Mufti Muneeb ur Rehman in the chair. The zonal committee’s moon-sighting meetings will also be held in Sindh, Balochistan, Peshawar and Punjab.

The Met office had predicted that there are good chances of sighting the Shawwal moon on June 25 evening as it will born on the morning of June 24 at 7:13am and will be visible in most parts of the country where skies are likely to remain clear or partly cloudy.

According to Maulana Samiullah Jan Farooqui, a 12-member committee at masque Qasim Ali Khan received 52 witnesses accounts about moon-sighting across the province, of which 41 had been verified. Thus, it announced to celebrate Eid on Sunday.

Earlier, the government had decided to hold the meeting of Central Ruet-e-Hilal Committe at Peshawar to eschew the controversy surrounding moon-sighting. However, the government shifted the venue of the meeting from Peshawar to Islamabad, citing security concerns.