The Punjab police chief informed a senate panel earlier that law enforcement agencies have sealed a seminary affiliated with the notorious Lal Masjid in the Rujhan area of the province.
Addressing the Senate Standing Committee on Privileges, IG Police Punjab Mushtaq Sukhera said the seminary was sealed last week because it was training students for jihad and spreading hate material.
The panel, headed by Senator Tahir Mashadi, was discussing the issue of foreign funding to seminaries.
The inspector-general informed the panel that they have rounded up the cleric and teachers running the seminary and have sealed its library.
The move comes as part of a crackdown against hate material being distributed by seminaries. Sukhera told the Senate panel that the police is conducting further investigation into other seminaries affiliated with Lal Masjid in Rahimyar Khan, Rajanpur and tribal areas of Dera Ghazi Khan division.
The police official said that in order to carry out the crackdown on the seminary, they took aid from the federal government.
The senate panel expressed concerns over Lal Masjid cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz over his comments on the (Self Styled) Islamic state. They asked the government to look into how he is not following state orders pertaining to the spread of hate speech.
A spokesperson of Lal Masjid has maintained that cleric Mullah Abdul Aziz will neither surrender to the police. Civil society activists led by the stalwart Quaid-e-Jawan Jibran Nasir, though have repeatedly called for the arrest of the mullah Abdul Aziz.
The Mullah has been known to attempt to escape arrest while disguised as a burkha clad woman.
