Faizel Patel, 2016-06-28

While the holy month of Ramadan offers a splendour of blessings, the recitation of the holy Qur’an remains paramount.

Ramadan is the blessed month in which the Quran was revealed to Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) by the Angel Jibraeel (AS) in the cave of Hira in Makkah, Saudi Arabia more than 1,400 years ago.

While Many Muslims try and complete at least one recitation of the Quran during Ramadan, spare a thought for those that are visually impaired – They have the ability to listen to the recitation of the holy book, but yearn to read it themselves.

Madrassa An-Noor for the blind which is an Islamic institute for the visually impaired is trying to bridge that gap, making the Qur’an available in Braille for Muslims who are blind.

The organisation has built its own recording studio producing “Talking Books” and have also established a printing press to produce a braille Qur’an including embossing machines to print Islamic books also in Braille.

Madrassa An-Noor has also embarked on an outreach program organizing Qur’anic Braille workshops in different parts of the world including India, Mauritius, England, Scotland, Bangladesh, and Mozambique and locally in South Africa.

“The purpose of these workshops was to train Ulama and Qur’an teachers and empower them so that the blind benefit directly.”

Madrassa An-Noor are also developing the first mobile app for the Blind which besides the standard menu of the Holy Quran will cater for Salaah, Masajid, Halaal requirements and determining the direction of the Qiblah using high pitched vibration sounds.

Meanwhile for the fifth year in Gaza, visually impaired children have joined a recitation course during Ramadan to learn how to read the Qur’an.

The Qur’an and Sunna Society in Gaza organises the courses and provides copies of the Qur’an written in Braille.

Supervisor Mohamed Yassin told Middle East Monitor (MEMO) that the charity started to organise the courses because high demand.

Yassin says more then a 120 blind children have completed the course over the last four years.