DA’WAH CORNER

Financial Support Guidelines

This document is intended to serve following objectives:

• Will assist Da’wah Corner in offering financial help for new Muslims.
• Will serve as a knowledge snippet to the rest of Da’wah community. As an organization which introduces innovative solutions, we are obliged to share our learning experiences with other Da’wah organizations and help them grow. In turn serve as a guideline for other organizations when offering financial support for new Muslims.

Introduction

Many who embrace Islam do not have sound financial backgrounds. Except for fortunate few, new Muslims usually face various problems after embracing Islam. Some are driven from home, hated by relatives and/or distanced by friends. Some others lose their jobs thus find no means of living and face severe economic hardship.

Da’wah is not only inviting people to Islam. In times like these where there is no proper Islamic social framework to support new Muslims, the responsibility of looking after reverts is on us, the Da’ees. We have to be sensitive of these issues and strive our best to help revert brothers and sisters. It is our obligation to uplift them both in terms of spiritual, social and economic aspects.  This was a unique feature of Prophet’s society in Madeenah. The society we all are trying to achieve.

When a person embraces Islam, he or she should been as an example to rest of the community in particular his/her pre Islamic society. The person should be seen as financially capable and competent not as loser because of embracing Islam.

What we do when a person needs financial support

Many visit DC seeking help of financial nature. Some are genuine while some are not. Being a Da’wah organization which is concerned about how the funds are utilized effectively, we have the responsibility of verifying every case for its genuineness before committing on any financial help.

DA’WAH CORNER adopts the following strategy to analyze every case to ensure its authenticity:

• Speak to the person who is need by questioning why they need, have they made any other effort to raise that amount before, have they reached any organization for support, if so, what are the places and people contacted and what their responses.
• Keeping records of the person (Name, contacts etc.), in order to cross check with other organizations.
• Checking the Islamic knowledge of the person in relation to the history of that person being a Muslim (ex: A person being a Muslim for the last four months but do not know the Suraah Fathihah, we probe further).
• When a person comes with the problem and the solution, we dig the history of the efforts the person has made to come out the problem, how practical the solution have been. In the case of the solution is impractical, we advice the person with our alternative. (ex: If a person comes for financial support to start a new business and the history of his business ability proves unhealthy, we support him in every way to find him a job and further ask him to make Du’a to Allah to make things easy for him because every thing lies with Allah and we cannot do anything without will)
• When a person comes with debt and interest (riba), we make the best of efforts to talk to the financial institutions to reduce the interest rates. If the person taken loans from relatives, we request the lenders to ease the person concerned from debt and interest. We never encourage anyone with debt to invest more in business. We advice them to settle the loans first.
• After the person presented case we make the visit to his/her place without prior notice and also we make visit to the local masjid and get further details on his relationship with the Masjid, any history of financial help provided my the Masjid or by the people of jaamaah in that area.
• If the case is proved authentic (based on the verified information), we do the best we can and if further support needed we request from donors for further support.
• If a situation arises where we cannot offer help because the case is not genuine, we explain them the reason to decline, making every effort not to hurt the person’s feelings.
• As a policy we don’t offer loans. But whenever we offer financial support, we offer that as a “loan” to give them a sense of accountability. But if the person succeeds in the effort, we write off the “loan”.
• After the financial help is given (ex: Investment made to buy equipments for a new Muslim), we make the visit to see how effective the solution has been.

If you are a person willing to contribute or support us:

• As a potential donor (individual or organization), you have every right to get as much information as needed prior to making any donation or extending any other support.
• Once the donation is done, the donor can request any report from DA’WAH CORNER to know how the funds are being utilized.
• If any needy case was initiated and handled through DA’WAH CORNER, the related contribution or donation should be done through DA’WAH CORNER only.

On the other hand DA’WAH CORNER will maintain total transparency of handling all donations and funding with its donors.

How can you contribute?

You can contribute to this noble cause by:

• Sadaqa

Helping a new Muslim leads to continues Sadaqa even after the death of a person (Sadaqathu Jaariyah). You can contribute your Sadaqa through Da’wah Corner.

• Zakaath

Muallafathul Quloob (New Muslims) is a category that deserves Zakaah. If you are a person who would like to contribute this portion to this category, you can always do through Da’wah Corner.

• Donations

These are the donations in Allah’s cause.

You can direct all your contributions to Da’wah Corner bank account

Account name:           DAWAH CORNER

Account number:      8930016456

Bank name:                   Commercial Bank of Ceylon PLC.

Bank Address:              “Commercial House”

No. 21, Bristol Street,

P.O. Box 856, Colombo 1,

Sri Lanka.

Swift code:                     CCEYLKLX

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