Muslims shun project funded by lottery
Ruth Gledhill, Religion Correspondent
An unfinished community centre for use by Muslims has become a rat-infested eyesore, shunned by the people it was intended to serve because it was funded by a Muslim lottery winner.
The skeletal framework of the community centre in the Bastwell area of Blackburn, Lancashire, has been rotting and abandoned for eight years after a £300,000 donation from Britain’s first lottery millionaire.
Mukhtar Mohidin, from Blackburn, won £17.9 million in 1994. But his attempts to give something back to his community have proved fruitless, after a dispute broke out among local Muslims, who said that the centre had been built using “filthy money” because Islam does not allow gambling.
The community centre scheme was led by the nearby Masjid Al Momineen Mosque, which has been unable to raise the £400,000 pounds needed to finish the building because of opposition from Muslims in the area.
The Lancashire Council of Mosques said that the mosque was unable to obtain donations because gambling is prohibited by the Koran.
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1) Muslims shun project funded by lottery
Saturday, April 28, 2007
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