In her letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Ms Jayalalithaa pointed out that the Tamil Nadu State Hajj Committee had received more than 12,100 applications this year for Hajj 2012. The Hajj Committee of India in Mumbai, had allotted a quota of only 2863 seats for Tamil Nadu. This was woefully inadequate, Ms Jayalalithaa stated.

The Chief Minister pointed out that as per the guidelines for Hajj 2012, out of the total quota of 2863 seats, 1146 seats would be apportioned for reserved categories and about 1717 seats would be dispensed for selection under the general category. The number of disappointed applicants would be around 9243.

During Hajj 2011, the Hajj Committee of India had initially allotted a quota of 3049 seats against the receipt of more than 10,000 applications from Tamil Nadu. After the release of additional quota and Government discretionary quota, a total of 4084 pilgrims from this State were able to perform the Hajj pilgrimage during 2011. However, the quota for this year was fixed as 2863 only which was an all time low, she noted.

The Chief Minister therefore, requested the intervention of the Prime Minister to enhance the quota taking into account the sizable Muslim population and the large number of applications received from Tamil Nadu for 2012.

She requested the Prime Minister to instruct the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, to release a suitable additional number, so that a greater number of pilgrims from Tamil Nadu would be benefited and enabled to perform the Hajj pilgrimage in 2012, she said.