By MM Staff
New Delhi : A large white and blue truck pulls up outside a stadium in central Japan and slowly expands into a place of worship.
Welcome to the Mobile Mosque.
As Japan prepares to host visitors from around the world for the 2020 Summer Olympics, a Tokyo sports and cultural events company has created a mosque on wheels that its head hopes will make Muslim visitors feel at home.
A staff member operates Mobile Mosque during an unveiling event in Toyota, western Japan.
A staff member operates Mobile Mosque during an unveiling event in Toyota, western Japan.
Yasuharu Inoue, the CEO of Yasu Project, said the possibility that there might not be enough mosques for Muslim visitors in 2020 is alarming for a country that considers itself part of the international community. His Mobile Mosques could travel to different Olympic venues as needed.
“As an open and hospitable country, we want to share the idea of `omotenashi’ (Japanese hospitality) with Muslim people,” he said in a recent interview.
The mosque on wheels has capacity for 50 worshippers.
The mosque on wheels has capacity for 50 worshippers.
The first Mobile Mosque was unveiled earlier this week outside Toyota Stadium, a J-League soccer venue in Toyota City, which is also the headquarters of the car company with the same name.
The back of the modified 22-tonne truck flipped up to reveal an entrance and then the side slid out, doubling the width of the truck. The 48-square-metre room can accommodate 50 people.
Muslim guests prayed inside the mosque, which includes outdoor taps and a washing area for pre-worship cleansing.
Indonesian students who were victims of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami also participated in the debut ceremony.
“The Mobile Mosque is very important to Muslim people such as Japanese people or tourists, Muslim tourists who visit Japan,” said 14-year-old Nur Azizah. “I want to show my friends.”
An estimated 100,000 to 200,000 Muslims live in Japan.Tatsuya Sakaguchi, a Japanese guest, expressed hope that the Mobile Mosque would help open people’s minds worldwide.”Looking in from the outside at the people in the mosque, they looked very happy,” said Sakaguchi, the representative director of an Osaka retail company.
Inoue said the inspiration for the project came to him on a trip to Qatar four years ago.
Initially, the project organisers plan to target international sporting events both in Japan and overseas. Inoue said he hopes the project will do more than fill a gap in religious infrastructure.
“Going forward, I would be so happy if people from Indonesia, Malaysia, Africa, the Middle East and, for example, refugees who are coming from Syria are able to use the mosque as a tool to promote world peace,” he said.
On the contrary, authorities in UP have resorted to watering the ground in Noida Parks just before the Friday prayers. 3 months ago, the incident was reported from a public park in Noida Sector 58 where mostly Muslim employees working in different MNC’s offer the congregational Friday prayers.
An employee wishing not to be named who offers Namaz in the same park said “Friday prayers were being offered in the said park in Sector 58 since 2013 and there are no reasons to suddenly stop it”
Earlier the Uttar Pradesh Police had ordered offices and establishments to direct their Muslim employees to stop offering Friday prayers in open areas such as parks.
According to a notice issued by police stations in Noida, including at the Sector 58 industrial hub, companies will be held liable if their employees are found violating the directive.
Companies in the area then sought a meeting with senior Noida police officers for clarification on the matter, particularly on the clause that threatens to hold them liable for violations of the order by employees.
Executives of some of the companies who have been served the notices said there is widespread concern among units in sectors other than where the notices have already been served. It has also sparked worries that the ambit of the directive could be widened to include other areas in the National Capital Region township. Sector 58 is predominantly an IT and services hub.
The Noida Police has defended the move citing concerns that communal harmony could be disturbed, especially in the run-up to the upcoming Lok Sabha elections in 2019.
(With inputs from AP)
Mindset difference between Japanese and UP CM….
Japan is free from terrorism because there are no Mosques. Japan does not allow Islam to spread in their land. Hence Japan has remained peaceful country.
Wrong information. There are masajid and muslims in Japan too and people with Japanese origin are also muslims.
Shame on Muslim-majority countries who didn’t freeze jobs/oil/goods yet UPwalas, UPCMYA. PMNDM, BjPAS, PMO, Opposition, including Congress, is doomed to regret/fail w/o Muslims in India/NRI, I say.
Bigness demands openness, fairness, justice, not prejudice against anyone. Yogi, Modi, Shah, Jaitley, Rahul, and the Indian Parliament (LS+RS) put their head, singly, jointly, and nationally into the sand, like an ostrich, to say the least. Does the present Constitution, its Preamble, under which they took their respective office to allow this? Shame on ALL of us/NRI/US to call India the largest democracy!!
Where are the replies/counter comments from the community financing such nefarious/abhorring acts minting $+ from countries, corporations, partnerships with those who need water for ablution/namaz?