{"id":6359,"date":"2016-10-14T17:24:37","date_gmt":"2016-10-14T11:54:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kashmir.today\/?p=6359"},"modified":"2016-10-14T17:24:37","modified_gmt":"2016-10-14T11:54:37","slug":"14-fridays-no-congregational-prayers-jamia-masjid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/?p=6359","title":{"rendered":"14 Fridays on: No congregational prayers at Jamia Masjid"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><em><strong>Srinagar:<\/strong><\/em> For the fourteenth consecutive <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956314\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Friday<\/span><\/span> today, authorities didn\u2019t allow congregational prayers at historic Jamia Masjid nor did they permit the call for prayers, much to the disappointment of thousands of devotees who would normally offer <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956315\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Friday<\/span><\/span> prayers there.<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>The last Friday prayers were offered at the historic Masjid on <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956316\"><span class=\"aQJ\">July 8<\/span><\/span>, on the third day of Eid-ul-Fitr.<br \/>\nPeople in Srinagar mostly prefer to offer <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956317\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Friday<\/span><\/span> prayers at the masjid.<br \/>\n\u201cThe last time we offered <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956318\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Friday<\/span><\/span> prayers at Jamia Masjid was some days before Eid-ul-Fitr. Now Eid-u-Azha is approaching. Authorities have imposed curfew also on our religious activities,\u201d said local people.<br \/>\nThey added that the move is time and again hurting religious sentiment of Muslims in Kashmir.<br \/>\n\u201cThe curbs on religious affairs are not good. If RSS can hold rallies in Jammu and Muslim Majority district in Jammu province why Muslims are bared for performing their religious activities in Kashmir,\u201d said locals at Nowhatta.<br \/>\nThe practice to disallow prayers in this Grand Masjid began in 1819. It happened during the time of Maharaja Ranjit Singh when the then Governor Moti Ram curbed prayers at the Masjid.<br \/>\n\u201cThat time, no prayers were offered and no call for prayers was given from the Masjid. The curbs remained in force for over two decades,\u201d said an academician.<br \/>\nNow since 2008 uprising, state government has recurrently denied <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956319\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Friday<\/span><\/span> prayers at the Masjid on one or another pretext.<br \/>\n\u201cThis is a direct interference in the religious affairs of people,\u201d said a group of devotees.<br \/>\nJamia Masjid was constructed by Sultan Sikandar, father of Zainul Aabideen alias Budshah between 1389-1420.<br \/>\nThousands of devotees who usually offer <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956320\"><span class=\"aQJ\">Friday<\/span><\/span> prayers in historic Jamia Masjid include men, women and children.<br \/>\nTerming the locking down of religious places of Muslims as \u201cpainful\u201d, devotees said: \u201cThis is the darkest era we are going through. We have never seen such a longest period when Jamia Masjid was locked down. It is direct interference in the religious affairs.\u201d<br \/>\nMeanwhile, authorities <span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_220956321\"><span class=\"aQJ\">on Friday<\/span><\/span> imposed curfew-like restrictions in various areas of Srinagar prevent a separatist called protest march.<br \/>\nContingents of police and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in full riot gear were deployed in both uptown and old city areas of Srinagar to impose curfew-like restrictions to prevent a separatist called sit-in and protest march here. <strong><em>(KNS)<\/em><\/strong>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Srinagar: For the fourteenth consecutive Friday today, authorities didn\u2019t allow congregational prayers at historic Jamia Masjid nor did they permit the call for prayers, much to the disappointment of thousands of devotees who would normally offer Friday prayers there. The last Friday prayers were offered at the historic Masjid on July 8, on the third [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6360,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-union-territory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6359\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kashmir.watch\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}