Our second HMC programme in Birmingham took place on Sunday 13th July at Masjid Abdullah ibn Masood (radhiallahu anhu), almost one month after the first programme in Birmingham Jame Masjid on 15th June.
The programme began with recitation from the Holy Qur’an, followed by a beautiful Naat in praise of the Prophet (sallallahu alayhi wasallam) by Maulana Saeed Ali Shah. Thereafter, Maulana Imdadullah Qasmi Sahib spoke for approximately 20 mins on the issue of halal and successfully covered a number of important points. To summarise, his speech was about the importance of adopting the correct attitude towards this issue and he finished by saying that this work can only continue if the public supports HMC.
Shaykh Zahir Mahmood was meant to deliver the speech in English, but unfortunately, was unable to attend due to other commitments. He was meant to be replaced by Mufti Muhammad Sajjad who was also unable to attend, so eventually, I was left to deliver the speech in English. I mentioned a few verses of the Qur’an and main ahadith on importance of halal and the detrimental effects of consuming haram.
After this, Brother Salim Ingar delivered the HMC presentation in English, with short bursts of Urdu every now and then and a great deal of direct interaction with Maulana Imdadullah Qasmi. Finally, there was enough time for a few questions from the congregation.
Alhamdulillah, the congregation was extremely receptive and really took the message of HMC on board. This could be gauged from both the feedback we received straight after the programme and also the emails forwarded to the office.
It wouldn’t be wrong to say that there was a certain amount of dismay that there were currently no HMC certified outlets in the area, and some brothers expressed their concerns regarding this predicament.
At the end of the programme, a request was made to the brothers to come forward and volunteer to help HMC in their respective areas, as this is one of the most important steps to spread the work of HMC beyond the Aston and Lozells area. Alhamdulillah, six brothers gave me their contact details after the programme, saying that they were willing to help in whatever way they possibly could.
After the programme, Maulana Imdadullah Qasmi said that he considered the programme to have been a great success, as the number of attendees far exceeded his expectations and the usual attendance at previous programmes held at Masjid Abdullah ibn Masood. He also stressed the importance of holding a sister’s event in the area.
We were also fortunate to have been blessed with the presence of Hadhrat Maulana Noorul Islam Sahib, one of the senior ulama of Bangladesh in the field of exposing the falsehood of Qadianism. In my conversation with him after Maghrib salah, he said that this was the work of mujaddids; to worry about halal consumption for the Muslim Ummah.
Insha-Allah, we hope and pray Allah grants even more success to our coming programmes and all work of HMC across the UK and abroad. Amin.
Javed Iqbal
Birmingham, UK
