Shahjadpur Mosque

Hazrat Sayed Shah Rasti (R.A) is a celebrated Sufi Muslim figure in Bengal. Shah Rasti's name is associated with the Muslim movement into north-eastern Bengal and the spread of Islam in Bangladesh. He spread Islam in Bangladesh through Sufism, part of the long history of travel between the Middle East, Central Asia, Indian Subcontinent and East Asia. He was buried in Chandpur, Bangladesh, formerly known as Shahrasti, while the Thana, post office, Upazila, and School are named in his honor.

Early life and education: Shahrast's date and place of birth is not certain. He was Born in Mecca, Arab and later moved to Bagdad, Iraq as a child with his family. He excelled in his studies a studied in Islamic study and Islamic theology. He achieved spiritual perfection (Kamaliyyah) after years of study and meditation.

Travel to India: According to legend, He came in India with a group of Muslim saints. All saints had a handful of soil, they had to choose to settle and propagate Islam in any place in India where the soil exactly matched. Shahrasti reached India in c.1300. He matched the soil with the soil of Camilla and stayed on a hill. But the place was wrong. After that, a tiger came to him to the right place where the soil exactly matched that later life.

During the later stages of his life, Shahrasti devoted himself propagating Islam. Under His guidance, thousands of Hindus and Buddhists converted to Islam. His brother Sayed Shah Mahbub and two companions were with him. He was unmarried; his Brother Shah Mahbub’s son Sayed Shah Giasuddin was his successor and descendant. His descendants are still living in beside the Dargah. He is buried in Chandpur in his Dargah (Tomb), which is located in Shahrasti, the area is named in his honor. His shrine is famous in Chandpur and throughout Bangladesh, with hundreds of devotes visiting daily.

Walipur Alamgiri Mosque is situated in Walipur village under Hajiganj Upazila of Chandpur district. There are two mosques in the same locality - one known as Shahi Alamgiri Mosque and the other as Shah Shuja Mosque. The Alamgiri mosque has suffered much due to subsequent restoration works. Nevertheless, enough still survives to give an idea of its original plan and design. A Persian inscription in fine nastaliq character, fixed over the central doorway, records the construction of the mosque by one Abdullah in 1692 AD in the reign of Alamgir Aurangzeb.

In the middle of the eastern facade of the oblong mosque (15.24 m by 8.23 m) there is a projected fronton bordered with octagonal turrets through which opens out the main doorway. This has a higher arch with a half-dome within a rectangular frame. There are two more doorways in the eastern facade, one on either side of the central opening, having an outer arch with a half-dome below. Each of the north and south walls is pierced with a pair of arched doorways. The mosque has therefore seven archways in total -three in the east and two on each of the north and south walls. The four exterior angles of the building are strengthened by octagonal towers, which are carried beyond the horizontal parapets and topped over with kalasa finials, but have now been renovated.

Two massive octagonal brick pillars divide the interior of the mosque into five square bays - a large one in the middle (5.87m a side) and two smaller ones on its either side which are arranged in the east-west axis. Archways interconnect the bays; the arches are placed directly on two free standing octagonal pillars and engaged semi-octagonal pillars. It is worth noting that these arches are continued upwards as walls to make the bays above. This special device has given the mosque a two-storied appearance internally. All the five bays are roofed over with domes crowned with lotus and kalasa finials on cylindrical drums. The domes are carried on half-domed squinches on the upper corners and the blocked arches in between the square inches in the middle of the walls.

Octagonal turrets rising high above the horizontal parapets border the outside projection of the central mihrab, like that of the central archway. Inside, there are three mihrabs in the qibla wall. The central mihrab is semi-octagonal in design, but the flanking mihrabs are of the shallow rectangular type.

The original plastering of the building has been replaced by modern cement plaster. The horizontal parapet is now plain. The facade of the central archway projection is marked with shallow rectangular panels, each being further enriched with such motifs as plants and small trees with flowers in stucco. The central mihrab arch springs from beautifully decorated pilasters and has foliaged designs at its spandrels. The rectangular frame of the central mihrab, though now barely plain, is topped over with a frieze of blind merlons. A fine specimen of Mughal stucco ornamentation is still preserved in the squinches and blocked arches in between, which support the domes above. The extrados of the squinch arches and blocked arches are ornamented with interlocking scrolls, while the tympanums of the blocked arches are minutely embellished with floral scrolls with intertwining rosettes in the centers. Above them all round the interior base of the cylindrical drum runs a slightly sunken frieze decorated with floral scrolls.

Five-domed type mosque, one of the important varieties of Bengal mosques, shows two sub-types: (a) a mosque with a large central dome and a pair of small domes on each side in the same line and (b) a mosque with a large central dome and four small domes on the corners. The present mosque is the culminating example of the second variety. Both in planning and in the execution of elevation details of the building, the architect and the artisans have left behind a clear mark of their skills and perfection of ideas. The division of the interior of the mosque into five squares has been very scientifically effected by the disposition of two octagonal short massive freestanding pillars instead of the two east-west wide arches of the previous examples of the series. Mosques on this model were not built in Bengal for a long time, but almost two centuries later the type reappeared in the Becharam Dewri Mosque (1872) in the city of Dhaka. In plan Becharam Dewri Mosque is an exact copy of the Alamgiri Mosque but inferior in quality and elevation details.

Such mosque design in Bengal started with austagram mosque and evolved through the sarail mosque and the Walipur Alamgiri Mosque. The design is really unique. Question may now arise as to the origin of this particular kind of Bengal mosques. In Turkey under the early Ottomans the mosque of Rustam Celebi (c first half of the 15th century) at Tokat provides perhaps the earliest known example of its kind with five domes - the large central one and a small one on four corners. Similar plan is also found in such other Ottoman mosques as the Guzelce Hasan Bey Mosque (1406) in Hayrabolu and the Uc Serefeli Cam (1437-47) at Edirne. These mosques are generally regarded as the precursors of the great Ottoman mosques at Istambul - Bayezid mosque (1501-06), Sulaymaniya Mosque (1550-59), and the beautiful Selimya Mosque (1569-75) at Edirne. The five-roomed or five-domed planning of the Ottoman mosques may perhaps be said to have been dictated by those of some early Muslim buildings of Syria.

In India the Jamat Khana Mosque (1310-16) at Delhi is a lone example of its kind. This mosque design continued to have been practiced in Northern India in an elaborated form in Humayun's Mosque (1530) at Agra, where four small domed-rooms, instead of two, are attached on either side of the large central domed chamber. It may, therefore, be said that the plan of the second variety of the five-domed type mosques in Bengal was not innovated by Bengal architects, and its idea is very likely to have been borrowed from the sources stated above, particularly perhaps from those of Turkey or Upper India.

Written by: MA Bari

Nayabad Mosque is located in the bank of the river Dhepa, just 1.5 km south-west of the infamous Kantaji Temple at Dinajpur in Bangladesh. The mosque is named after the village “Nayabad” in which it stands in the Police Station of Kaharole. According to an inscription found on the central doorway, it was constructed at 1793 AD in the reign of Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II. During that period, Raja Baidyanath, the last of the Dinajpur Royal family, was the Zaminder (feudal land owner).

Nayabad Mosque was erected at a time when the soil of Dinajpur had already been enriched with one of the most remarkable Navaratna temples, the Kantajew Temple in 1752 AD. The founding Royal family of Dinajpur was still prominent. According to local traditions, the mosque was built by Muslim architectural workers who had come to this place from the west to build Kantaji Temple. They had settled in Nayabad, a village near the temple, and had built the mosque for their own use. There is a grave of an unknown person in the premises of the mosque. Local people believe, this is the grave of Kalu Khan, the master architect of Kantaji Temple.

It is an oblong three-domed mosque with octagonal towers at the four corners. There are three arched entrances to enter the mosque. Among them, the central one is bigger than the flanking ones. These are equal in height and width. There is an arched window each on the south and north sides. Inside in the western wall there are three Mihrabs in line with the three entrances. The central Mihrab is bigger than the flanking ones which are of equal size. Three hemispherical domes cover the mosque, of which the central one is bigger than the side ones. Pendentives have been used in their phase of transition. The parapet and cornice are straight.

Terracotta plaques have been used in decoration of the mosque. At present there are about 104 terracotta plaques rectangular in shape, used in the surface decoration of the mosque walls. The platform of the mosque is enclosed by a low brick wall with only one access from the east. On either side of the mosque are to be seen a number of tombs each of found fixed over the central doorway of the mosque.

Baparipara Shahi Mosque is located at 1 km distance from Rajarhat Upazila of Kurigram district. The Mosque length is 32 feet and width is 10 feet. It is surrounded by 3 ft high wall. There are 3 door, 1 decorated gate, 2 tower and 4 high tower situated on the four corner of the Mosque. On the center of the roof, there are three big domes. There are no inscription found about the Mosque. From its architectural sign, you can guess Baparipara Shahi Mosque is around 200 year old.

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