November 11, 2013 The Prince of Wales laid flowers on the tomb of one of India’s most revered Sufi saints today as its imam prayed for the health and happiness of Britain’s royal family. The visit to the shrine or ‘dargah’ of Haji Ali Shah Bukhari, one of Mumbai’s most celebrated landmarks, was to…
October 25, 2013 I saw a wooden coffin, I answered the phone call to tell us that Umma, as we called our mother in Bengali, had left us, and later that same night saw her lying still like a ragdoll in the hospital ward. The burial was almost immediate. Within hours I was at the…
Muslims around the world will celebrate the Islamic Festival of Sacrifice tomorrow (Eid al Adha). The festival celebrates the sacrifice made by Abraham mentioned in the Qur’an. This is the biggest holiday of the Muslim world and it coincides with end of the pilgrimage to Mecca. In some countries, such as Morocco, this festival is…
25 September 2013 Newspaper Trouw reports that the number of Dutch Muslims planning to travel to Mecca this year has almost halved in comparison to previous years. 16 travel agencies in the Netherlands are allotted 5,000 visas a year from Saudi Arabia to allow Dutch Muslims to make the journey. This year some agencies…
21 August 2013 In partnership with the British Museum in London, Leiden’s National Museum of Ethnology is displaying an exhibition dedicated to the Hajj. More than 250 objects from Indonesia and Morocco have been collected for the show, including 80 works from the Nasser D. Khalilii Collection of Islamic Art. The exhibition is to…
