Ron Greaves – Early Muslim Life and Growth in Leeds

Greaves explores in his research that besides the large majority of migrants from Mirpur and Bengal who were largely uneducated village people, there was a small minority of settlers in Britain who came to further their education and gain better qualifications.

Although Leeds contains small groups of migrants from all these areas, by far the most dominant group in the city, as in Birmingham and Bradford, is the Mirpuris. There is also a significant minority of Bangladeshis mainly originating from Sylhet. Religious practices did exist, but were essentially used for ‘rites of passage’. The first settlers in Leeds had obtained a burial -9- plot for Muslims in Harehills cemetery as early as 1953.

No-one in the city was prepared to sell the Muslims a property which could be converted to use as a Mosque. In 1957, Conrad Kramer, a solicitor of Portuguese Jewish descent, suggested that the Muslims purchase the synagogue at 21 Leopold Street in Chapeltown which had been donated by Portuguese Jews in 1922. The Bengalis Muslims had to wait for the Jewish congregation to find new premises in 1959 before negotiations could begin. By this time the Bengalis had raised £500 to purchase the Mosque which was not enough, however, to meet the £1,000 purchase price. According to their accounts, P.J.Shah, Chaudri Bostan Khan and Ahmad Shuttari persuaded the Bengalis to make the purchase of the mosque a venture involving the full Muslim community, promising to raise the rest of the money.

Mofizur Rahman claims that he persuaded the Bengalis to include the West Pakistanis in the interests of Muslim unity and that he was chosen to negotiate with them on the basis of his contacts amongst them. Some of the Bengali community were not happy with this arrangement and left the Pakistan Muslim Association. (It should be noted, however, that all the key figures mentioned above were sympathetic to the reform tradition of Islam, although moderate and non-sectarian in their approach. This attitude is still reflected in the Islamic Centre and the Jinnah mosque which is now used by Bengali Muslims). Despite this slight difference of opinion in the personal accounts of those interviewed, the Bengalis agreed and the Jinnah Mosque, the first in Leeds, opened in 1960.

By 1965 the growth of the community was beginning to accelerate. Under threat of changes in the immigration laws, all Asians were spurred on to bring their families to Britain.

With the increase in the Muslim population between 1981 and 1991 all the Mosques were under pressure to accommodate prayers, particularly on Fridays or during religious holidays. Mr. Shah was particularly aware of the increase of religious interest among young people, which he did not attribute to the world-wide resurgence of Islam but to the influence within the family. Religious education, he said, was provided in all the mosques, and the Islamic Centre had purchased a large hall to function as the Mosque school.