On 14th September 2008 the Abbasi Youth Committee hosted a debate entitled “This house believes that living in the West makes us more religious”. It has been a long time since a debate style event of this format has taken place and thus there was much excitement from the community before hand. This was then shown during the event where over 150 community members participated.

The programme began with a beautiful recitation from the Quran by brother Muhammed Ali.
The chair for the event, Br Adam Khimji, then took charge explaining the motion and the rules: Both sides had three speakers, two of which would speak for 5 mins after which the debate would open to the floor to make any comments or questions. Finally each side would present a summary before the all important vote. The chair was assisted by Kumail Lalji who was the timekeeper.

The proposition's first speaker Shane Abbas Hassam took the stand, he began by defining the motion. He defined the motion as 'This House Believes that living in the United Kingdom makes us more Spiritual, Believing and Faithful in Allah'. In response the first speaker from the opposition, Bilal Shiekh took the stand. He began his rebuttal and then brought forward the argument, amongst others, that the east being the Shia Countries of the world facilitate our religion and thus gives us more time to focus on our spiritual growth towards God. The third speaker of the night, Abbas Akber explained how living in the UK allows us to promote Islam and carry out valuable Tabligh and this was followed by Shoaib Merali from the opposition indicating how Iran and Iraq are the centres of Islamic knowledge, how can that not increase our spirituality?

The floor debate began with a number of deep questions posed to each side, both sides took time to think and gave fantastic answers to some well posed questions and statements.
The final summary speeches were made by Imran Somji and Hasnain Panjwani, representing the proposition and opposition respectively. Both speakers urged for the floor to make the right choice by voting for their respective sides.

The results of two votes are shown below:

The results of the vote clearly show that the motion 'This House Believes Living in the West Makes You More Religious' is defeated.

What the results of the vote do not show however is the great attendance this event had with over 150 participants recorded. No doubt this style of event is exciting and involves everyone thus the Abbasi Youth Committee will endeavour to have more of these.

If you would like to be involved in any of the AYC events please email abbasiyouth@gmail.com.