Coimbatore: The city on Friday witnessed muted celebrations of Milad un-Nabi, the birth anniversary of prophet Muhammed.
Usually, precessions by students of madrassas across the city, competitions for them and conferences to educate the public about the teachings of the prophet would mark the occasion.
M Abdul Hakkim, secretary, Jamaat e Islmai Hind, said, “But this year, we didn’t conduct any such events because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Instead, we organized ‘zoom’ meetings to deliver a lecture on the prophet and his teachings. This was in addition to the speeches at the mosques.”
He said they had conducted special prayers at the mosques for a week to mark the occasion and distributed food to the needy on Thursday evening. “To control the crowd, some mosques conducted prayers separately for men, women and children, while others asked the women and children to pray at their houses.”
Hakkim recalled many organizations used to come together and distribute food and pulses to the public every year on the occasion of Milad un-Nabi, Navarathri and Diwali to nurture communal harmony. “This year, we decided to limit it to just one time. We, along with organizations like Gandhi Ashram, would distribute rice and pulses to the elderly and HIV people on Saturday.”
A Abdul Jabber, general secretary, Coimbatore district united Jamaath, said unlike the previous years they had not organized competitions for the students of madrassas this time. “We limited the celebrations to prayers. We had advised people not to crowd the mosques and to pray at their houses itself.”
Several Muslim organizations, however, distributed food to the people in the city.