Peshawar barred from controlling Panj Tirath

Pakistan's Evacuee Property Trust Board (EPTB), which manages the shrines of Hindus and Sikhs, has stopped the district administration of Peshawar from taking control of temples in Panj Tirath, a Hindu religious site which has been declared as the national heritage.

The EPTB said no one can take control of the temples in Panj Tirath unless two cases pending in the Peshawar High Court are decided. EPTB Deputy Director Peshawar in an official communique to the Dy Commissioner said the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Archaeological Department has declared temples in Panj Tirath as the national heritage, but the EPTB has not been informed in writing till date about it.

Temples are property of the EPTB and declaring the temples as the national heritage without taking the EPTB into confidence is beyond any logic, it said.

"The EPTB is a federal department which has its own rules and regulations and no provincial government can prove that its law has an edge over the federal government laws. Therefore, the Peshawar District Administration should avoid taking control of the temples in Panj Tirath or its handing over to the archaeological department," it said.

The EPTB said no one can take control of the temples in Panj Tirath unless two cases pending in the Peshawar High Court are decided.