Grand Mawlid Festival 2010 in Netherlands

On 14th of March 2010, Minhaj Youth League held a grand Mawlid Festival for Muslim youth in the Netherlands. It is the largest Mawlid gathering in Dutch which attracted more than 900 people from different ethnic backgrounds. Main speakers were Ustadh Usama Canon (US) and our chief guest Hassan Mohi-ud-Din Qadri. The most exiting addition to this year’s program was the Children’s Mawlid which was held in a separate hall along with the main program.

The event started with a recitation from the Holy Qur’an by brother Sheraz Malik who has a gifted and heavenly voice. Right after the recitation, the stage was took over by an Indonesian nasheed group who performed in Arabic, Indonesian and English.

The host, brother Umar Mirza, who also happens to be the president of MYL, welcomed the guests and gave a brief introduction, aim and purpose of this Mawlid Festival. He also introduced the first speaker of the event Ramadan al-Qadri. Ramadan Qadri is the principal of Farghana institute (Manchester, UK) and a gifted speaker who speaks on the level of the youth. He spoke about the shama’il of Rasulullah (saw)

After the first speech, brother Tasneem Sadiq, secretary of Minhaj-ul-Quran International Netherlands, took the stage and gave a brief presentation about Minhaj-ul-Quran, its aims and objectives, current and future projects.

The host introduced certain features to the audience so that they would also be able to participate to some extent. One of the feature was that the audience could SMS to a mobile number with their thoughts and messages , which were then read out to the whole audience. There were also some quizzes during the whole program which could be answered by the audience.

This first session was concluded by a Turkish nasheed group called El Biruni, who sang the praises of the Prophet (saw) in their own unique style.

After a brief break for salaat al-Asr, the second session started with a lecture by Ustadh Usama Canon. He is a scholar who embraced Islam in 1996, studied under various scholars in America as well as abroad and is currently involved with the Taleef collective. He spoke about the Baraka of the Prophet (saw) and how to attain and implement it. His speech was very much characterized by his constant sending the salat and salam on the Prophet (saw).

Brother Tasneem Sadiq again took the stage, this time to inform the audience about the fatwa against terrorism and suicide bombings which had recently been published by Shaykh-ul-Islam Dr. Tahir-ul-Qadri. Thereafter Minhaj-ul-Quran France’s own homegrown nasheed singers, took the stage. They sang the praises of the Prophet (saw) in Arabic and urdu and mesmerized the public with their unique style.

The second session was followed by a break for almost 1,5 hours during which the participants could visit the foodstreet and the Mawlid Market where all kinds of stalls were set up. Minhaj-ul-Quran was also present with a stall with books, dvd’s of Shaykh-ul-Islam Dr. Tahir-ul-Qadri and information about Aghosh and other projects. Ustadh Usama Canon held a Q&A session which was received very positively. Questions were asked concerning the current political situation of the Netherlands, Islamic finance and about the permissibility of voting.

The last session started with a lecture of Mohammed Ghaly, who is an assistant professor at the University of Leiden. After his lecture two British ladies from Jamaican origin who call themselves Poetic Pilgrimage, spoke in their unique way about their attachment and love of the Holy Prophet (saw). This ‘Spoken Word’ was very much appreciated by the audience.

Right after them, the host finally introduced the main speaker of the event, Hassan Muhi-ud-Din Qadri, who is the son of Shaykh-ul-Islam Dr. Tahir-ul-Qadri. He gave his speech on the topic of the presence of the Holy Prophet (saw) after his demise and the way people are still able to be blessed by Rasulullah (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam).

The Moroccon nasheed group Al Wafae took the stage with their praises of the Prophet (saw) and concluded with the famous Tala’al Badru Alayna. Meanwhile, the main guests were already on the stage and sang along with the lines of this famous nasheed. The event was then concluded with an elaborate dua by Ustadh Usama Canon.

Pakistani, Dutch, Moroccon, Turkish, Indonesian, Surinami… different nationalities, from different cultures, nations and backgrounds were present just for the sake of the Milad of the prophet (SAW). Among the guests were Allama Hafiz Nazir Qadri, Qari Muhammad Zubair (Minhajian), Allama Ahmad Raza Naqshbandi (Minhajian), Allama Iqbal Azam (France) , Maqsood Shah Sahib (President MQI NL, the Hague), members from MYL sisters UK, MYL UK, MYL France and many other prominent guests and scholars from the Netherlands.

Every participant received a bottle of water, a rose flower, a sweet Turkish snack (‘Baklava’) and many thanks and dua’s at the exit. During the Mawlid Festival, this event was already broadcasted twice on the main news channel in The Netherlands.

The whole program was meticulously planned and well executed by the 50+ volunteers who worked day and night to make this possible. The credits of this goes solely to our Shaykh, Shaykh-ul-Islam Dr. Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri who keeps inspiring the youth to work tirelessly for the promotion of peace and integration in our communities.