Bank of Khyber to set up Islamic banking branch

PESHAWAR: The Bank of Khyber will open a separate branch to launch interest-free banking system in the Frontier province accomplishing the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal’s (MMA’s) key election manifesto of introducing interest free banking, a senior Bank of Khyber official told Daily Times on Friday on condition of anonymity. The official said the branch was likely to be opened before the end of June. The MMA government would allocate Rs 50 million for the branch. The network of such interest free banks would be expanded if the experiment proved successful, the official added.
However, the official had some doubts about the success and introduction of such an interest free branch of the bank with out proper and thorough research on practical Islamic banking. The official was concerned about several legal issues such as consent by account holders of the bank. “I have little hope that it would succeed. Al-Maizan Bank is the only bank operating on Islamic system of banking, but it’s in deep crisis,” said the official.

Taken From: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/

Saudi Arabia: Qur’an Commission grants scholarships

Jeddah: For the first time since its inception, the Jeddah-based International Commission for the Memorization of the Holy Qur’an will start granting scholarships to students who have memorized the Holy Book, so that they are able to pursue further studies at universities.

A sum of SR 568,728 has been set-aside for this purpose, and the objective is to encourage other prospective university students to commit to memory the Holy Book, before they proceed for higher studies. The students would be drawn mainly from Qur’an memorization centers that have been set up by the Commission in various parts of the world.

So far 280 such students have been granted scholarships, and they are now pursuing university courses in such subjects as engineering, medicine, dentistry, Islamic Studies, the Islamic Shari’a, Religious Fundamentals, and Arabic as a language and Computer Science. The Commission’s Qur’an Memorization Centers exist in such countries asLebanon, Yemen, Sudan, Palestine, Ethiopia, Ghana, Benin, Togo, Cameroon, Burkina Faso, Turkistan, Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz, Philippines, Bangladesh, Bosnia and Pakistan.

Taken From: http://www.islamicnews.org/english/en_daily.html

The Clerical Centre of the Muslims fight against drug addiction in Inghushetia

The meeting of the Council of Alims of Inghushetia that took place on April 7th discussed the urgent problem of today- drug addiction. Inghushetia hosts a large-scale work on countering drug addiction done by the Clerical Centre of the Muslims, imams of mosques, alims. Sermons are read in mosques, explanatory work is conducted in educational institutions.
The Council of alims adopted a decision according to which public refuses to take part in celebrations of a family, the member of which distributes or uses drugs. As the press-service of the Clerical Department of the Muslims of Inghushetia reported to Islam.ru, the reports on countering dissemination of drugs the Clerical Centre of the Muslims will present during the government meetings on this problem, which will take place every other month.

Taken From: http://eng.islam.ru/press/