POLL - Discount for Community Members

Kindly participate in following opinion poll and cast your vote on the right side section of your screen. You can provide comments also to support your vote.

At the end of voting period which is around two weeks, we will present the voting statistics and your comments in front of Hon. Secretary of Khoja (Pirhai) Shia Isna Asheri Jamaat.

Please participate in making some difference in our community.

Hope you will cast the vote with honesty and one person will NOT vote multiple times.

Question:

Do you think there should be separate discount for community members of Khoja (Pirhai) Shia Isna Asheri Jamaat in different community projects where you can submit your Jamaat Identity Card and avail the discount?

a) Yes
b) No
c) Don’t know

For example Fatimiyah Hospital, Fatimiyah School & College, Charges for renting property of Khoja Jamaat like Bhojani hall for majlis or wedding etc, charges for hiring jamaat transport or any other project of KPSIAJ.

Please vote!

Lack of Innovation

The target audience of this particular blog is limited to middle age parents whose children are between 2 years to 8 years, other than this criteria you might not get the essence of this blog. Although the concerns mentioned in this article are not much worrying at the moment but maybe after few years it will be top line issue for our children. Overall take it lightly and think over it!

When I was a kid the hot favorite cartoon series in those days were Tom & Jerry, Pink Panther, Woody wood pecker and few more. If I remember correctly, there was a fixed time daily, 30 mins. in morning and 30 mins. in evening. Good old daysJ. With the advancement in technology and bloom of media, 60 mins. became couple of hours and finally many dedicated channels for children were launched and the transmission became nonstop.

Nice innovation! No one is against it and infact it became easier for both parents and children as they do not have to wait for a specific time, whenever they get a chance they can watch cartoons. Usually most of the cartoon series in our time were purely for entertainment purpose and educational element was not emphasized, but with the progress today’s cartoon series are multipurpose, education with entertainment. Again not a bad modernization!

As you all are aware that we haven’t contributed much in animated media yet, most of these cartoon series are either made in west or now in India, the trend of western cartoons are not much changed as compare to our time, still pure entertainment but with only one enhancement, male/female relations are now highlighted in their stories like some love affairs or dance parties etc. As a matter of fact this is now in every media from Pakistani drama serials to Hollywood/Bollywood movies and if we want to switch on our TV sets than we have to leave with this fact.

Another major contributor of animated industry is India and you know the fact that desi will be attracted with desi, so most of our children are addicted to Indian cartoon channels, “POGO” is these days a super doper hit channel among children. They are doing excellent job from their perspective as they have amalgamated their religious teachings in their cartoons, initially there were some specific series for religious teachings and when they realized that actually this idea has worked beyond their expectation they adopted this idea in other cartoon series as well.

Interesting part of these cartoon series are, they focus on one religious person, for example these days a cartoon series “Hanooman” is being watched by most of the children, they have scripted it so well that the religious teaching is done in an appealing way. They have started the story when “Hanooman” was a child and highlighted all his small small stories so well that children are getting addicted to it. I must say that this is an excellent way to teach religious events and autobiography of religious heros as you all are aware that “a picture is worth 1000 words” and what if it is a full fledge movie? Another great advancement they did is every popular cartoon series are launched in two versions, English and Urdu and we all know that no matter how good our children are in English, Urdu has its own attraction for children of our society.

The easiest answer for this concern is to stop our children from these kind of cartoons, but is this really a good solution? Let me quote one more recent example, these days a cartoon series “CHOTA BHEEM” is most popular series among children, if you want to know the popularity graph just type “CHOTA BHEEM” on Google and check out the ratings. This cartoon series is no doubt very interesting and every second child waits for it, I have really seen a 3 year old child waiting for this cartoon and child’s day is not completed without watching this cartoon, you can imagine how popular this would be. It was use to be a pure entertainment series with some of Indian culture but as soon as popularity graph rose they introduced a new character “KRISHNA” a religious personality in Hinduism, now a new version of this cartoon series is launched “CHOTA BHEEM AUR KRISHNA” and same tactics are being followed in this cartoon also, teaching the autobiography and piousness of Krishna.

On the other end our children are not so much aware of religious persons of Islam, they only know what they are taught in schools or madressas and you can understand that there’s a huge difference in both the learning system (pictorial and theoretical). I was astonished when a 5 year old child was telling me details of “Hanooman” and “Krishna” and was singing their religious song “oom”, when I asked the child to tell me name of 12 imams he was speechless.

I admit that few organizations have worked on animated movies for children describing the event of Karbala and some animated videos to teach wazu and namaz but sadly it couldn’t grab children’s attention. We need to know that children needs entertainment and you have to device a way for educational entertainment.

If not thousands, atleast there are hundreds of stories describing childhood events and small educational lessons from different prophets and Imams (a.s.), the way they use to live during their childhood, their interaction with different people of their age and elder people, stories of their sons and daughters etc. What does our child knows about it? The only source for a normal Muslim is the subject “Islamiat” taught in school and at max the madressa but again it is very difficult to build their interest as they take schools and madressas as a part of their studies and not entertainment, I don’t know whether it is permissible to make animated videos for children based on prophet’s and imam’s (a.s) stories as a complete serial in an entertaining fashion, but if this is not an option, we have to look for some alternatives else our children will remain unaware of Islamic personalities. Same as what we are today, if I take my example I don’t know much about childhood of different prophets and imams, all I know is what usually mentioned in majlis or what I have learned in madressa. That’s it! But yes my kid will know lot about other religious personality as compare to his own religion and this is only due to “LACK OF INNOVATION”.

What do you think!

Bait ul Maal

Bait ul Maal: Instead of extracting any definition of this word from any dictionary or thesaurus lets first think ourselves, what can be a good classification of this word for a common man of any era? General answer will be, it is a depository where all the reserves and assets are accumulated for any functioning body. Without discussing further on it, let’s jump to another question.

What is a welfare state and how does it function?

An interpretation of a welfare state mentioned by Wikipedia is:

“A model in which the state assumes primary responsibility for the welfare of its citizens. This responsibility in theory ought to be comprehensive, because all aspects of welfare are considered and universally applied to citizens as a "right".

Excellent! This means when it’s a citizen’s right, someone can ask that till which extend state should be responsible, as expenses will never end. So the terminology “right” means “basic resources necessary to maintain a good standard of living.”

Now the second part, how does welfare state functions? Again we will try to find out common man’s perception for this question.

The simplest answer can be, the more you earn the more you deposit into BAIT UL MAAL in form of taxes and the accumulated amount will be utilized for the welfare of people. (Memorize it)

Last question, what is Khums? It is a pillar of Islamic Economic System. You can now see the beauty of our religion, remember, in a welfare state “the more u EARN the more you have to pay” but in Islamic system the “the more you SAVE the more you pay”.

Any sensible person can conclude that KHUMS based system is far better than Welfare State System but the point is, “Welfare” can be seen in welfare states but where is “Welfare” in khums based societies?

Before proceeding further on this topic let’s make an assumption that every Shia Isna Asheri person is paying khums regularly, if someone is not paying Khums, I doubt calling him Shia Isna Asheri as in our religion who ever has grabbed the right of Janab-e-Sayyeda (s.a.) is considered to be lanatullah no matter how honorable is he considered by other people.

Now if most of shia isna asheri sect followers are giving khums and also we are receiving huge amount of khums/zakat/donations etc. from other places like African, European and North American countries why is so that still there are huge number of shia isna asheri persons who are living below average life and those who are somehow able to maintain their routine expenses are collapsed in case of any unavoidable conditions. Is there any central point today where a momin can go and put forward his issue and a good solution is provided to him?

Any ideas? Why in-spite of fulfilling our religious duties in terms of finance, we are unable to implement a true Islamic society?

Khums is just one pillar, Zakat, Charity, Sadqa are also financial duties of a momin. What can be done to implement the ideal condition, let’s make a model for Khoja community and it can be broaden to entire shia community.

Suppose in Karachi, most of the Khoja community people give their khums to 8-12 different organization/individuals (it can be listed very easily), first of all those 8-12 people should structure an internal group and apart from their respective projects/activities this committee should be combined under one umbrella and form a BAIT UL MAAL, for now let’s assume “Organization A” is formed which comprises of several other organization and individuals who have the permission from mujtahid to collect khums. All khoja community members plus international community who send their funds in Karachi should deposit their khums/zakat/charity to “Organization A”, this organization should be further sub-divided into different departments like Food, Education, health, marriage, emergency relief, professional development, madressas, imambargah fund etc etc. Depending on the current need and with consensus of all members, budget should be allotted to each department and when any of the khoja community members or any organization is in any kind of need, they can contact respective department and after following a pre-defined procedure the department can help the person.

Does it seems difficult? Believe me this is happening today also but the only change is, it will be done under one platform and in more managed way. Currently the funds are utilized without any co-ordination and due to this there is a high chance that different people are working on similar activities and other activities are not focused at all. Entire concept of interest free loans can also be introduced by this organization and the movement of funds can definitely bring a good change in our community.

Another benefit of this one window unit will be setting up project priorities. For example few years back there were no quality madressas in our community and there was urgent need to start good madressas, by the grace of Almighty Allah, several madressas are now operating in different areas specially soldier bazaar. Now what is the current need? To improve and enhance quality of existing madressas or building up a new madressa in same area & same lane?

Further on, this organization can highlight the current need of our community and most of the efforts should be made in that area. Let’s discuss current situation’s example, these days most the people are affected with the recession, many people are losing their jobs and many small business man have no choice left other than to windup their business, so the current need is some support for affected people, this could be providing loans/donations so their business can survive or generating some job opportunities etc. Another main stream requirement is the inflation support unit, the organization can devise a formula; let’s say a 2+2 (2 adult & 2 children) family needs Rs. 20,000/- to maintain a average living standard and current monthly income is Rs. 15,000/-, organization can look for different options to compensate the deficit, it can be either depositing Rs. 5,000/- into his bank account on monthly basis and on other side groom the person, his wife or any elder child so he can overcome the deficit.

I can write a complete book on “One Unit Operation and the concept of BAIT UL MAAL” but I think the core concept is mentioned for your thoughts, we all know that when Imam-e-Zamana (a.t.f.s) will come, he will form a true Islamic State where a poor person will not have to wait whole day long standing in front of a donor to receive a Rashon of Rs. 500/-

Can we not start to implement some Islamic economic system rules in our community and leave the rest on Allah (s.w.t) and Masoomeen (a.s.), they are always there to help and guide us.

Disgraceful Incident

Few weeks back I had updated a blog regarding sports activity in our Khoja Community and to my surprise people showed tremendous interest in it, I received several emails for appreciation and people sent me their details to contact them once such activity begins. As I was compiling the list to put it in some shape and start making arrangements for some sporting activity under any of my short-listed organization’s umbrella, I got to know that already a group of people have started working on same direction and the good news was that they had already made required arrangements to organize a full fledge sporting event. I was more than happy to know this news and instead of organizing a separate event, I emailed all interested candidates and provided them the information about that group and suggested them to participate in that event in large numbers.

Most of you know the details about that sporting event and what happened in the closing ceremony. For those who are still unaware let me brief you that how we added one more BLACK feather in our community’s cap.

I will not go into any details of such kind that who was correct and who was wrong nor I will mention names of any group as I did not witnessed that very moment but whatsoever the case was, the overall picture was not good and did not portrayed good image of our community.

Story begins with an organization that stepped up and arranged an inter community cricket tournament, open invitations were sent to all community members to submit their teams. People warmly welcomed the idea and good number of teams were registered. A professional venue was decided and all possible professional arrangements were made for the tournament. Event started with great excitement and was commencing quite successfully and then two top teams were selected for finals.

Many respected community members, members of managing committee and few of non community guests were invited for the final match followed by the closing ceremony, everything was set to ideal condition, large numbers of spectators were present in the stadium and the match started with great enthusiasm. At one point match umpire made a decision which was opposed by one team and then the argument started between both teams and umpire, soon the argument turned up into a dispute and finally the supporters also got involved and then very thing became a great mess. Abusive language and physical strikes destroyed the entire environment and at last the match was discontinued. You can easily imagine about the closing ceremony which was arranged after the match.

As I had already mentioned that I did not witnessed that specific moment which was the root of all dispute so I cannot comment on it and ofcourse there is high chance that the umpire made wrong decision, whatever was the case, was this correct way to react? Is this called sports man spirit? Is it professionalism?

As a normal community member I was very disappointed with all that happened, we are not united on a sporting platform which was at the end a game, how do we expect community members to be united on other platforms which are more serious than a game?

After this incident I was very discouraged and seriously I thanked Allah that it was not me who arranged this event, I highly doubt that any organization will now step up to organize these kind of sporting or any other events.

Let’s hope for the best and pray to Allah on our condition! Do prayers work when people themselves don’t want to change?