Why Mumbai is a draw for Muharram preachers

Recently, a journalist joked to leading Shia scholar and preacher Maulana Syed Aqeelul-Gharavi that there is no place on earth where Islam reached and he (Gharavi) has not gone, too.

- Mohammed Wajihuddin

Jokes apart, Muharram majlises or assemblies across the world scramble to get him for the initial days of Muharram to deliver the sermons. "There were invitations from many places, but I chose Mumbai. The city and its people fascinate me," says the London-based senior preacher.

Gharavi is not the only preacher from outside the city currently addressing Muharram majlises here. In fact, Mumbai attracts preachers for Muharram like a magnet. Gharavi has delivered Muharram sermons at the iconic 160year-old Masjid-e-Iranian at Dongri just for a couple of years the last two years in online mode. However, it was the late Maulana Mirza Mohammed Athar from Lucknow who never missed his Muharram sermons for 58 years at this mosque and entered the record books for being the first speaker in the world who delivered lectures for so long at one venue.