KOTA BARU: The government has allocated between RM300 million and RM400 million per year for haj subsidies, including for this year, said Senator Datuk Idris Ahmad.
However, the Minister in the Prime Minister's Department (Religious Affairs) said the exact amount will be known after the haj quota for the country has been finalised.
He gave the assurance that the government will continue to ensure that the cost for performing the pilgrimage will not burden the pilgrims including those from the B40 group.
He said the government has yet to announce the haj quota as it is still waiting for the official statement from the Saudi government on the matter.
"We will announce the cost and also the quota for the haj soon... but I want to assure that it will not burden the pilgrims," he told reporters after launching the Kelantan Mawaddah Centre here today.
The centre was a collaborative effort between the Kelantan Islamic Affairs and Religious Department (Jaheaik) and the state government.
Also present were State Welfare, Family and Women Development Committee chairman Datuk Mumtaz Md Nawi and Jaheaik's deputy director (operations) Dr Hasnan Ramli.
The Ministry of Hajj and Umrah of Saudi Arabia (MoHU) has announced that the number of pilgrims allowed for the haj season this year (1443Hijrah/2022) is limited to a million local and international pilgrims.
In an official statement shared on Twitter recently, the ministry said the number of international pilgrims for the year will be in accordance with the quotas allocated to each country, taking into account the compliance with all healthcare criteria.
On another note, Idris said Tabung Haji (TH) has recorded more than seven million depositors with savings below RM10,000 as of March 31.
"About 4,000 depositors have savings of more than RM1 million with while around 600,000 still maintained their saving accounts with Tabung Haji." he added.