On Tuesday, Athar Hussain, secretary of the Indo-Islamic Cultural Foundation (IICF) – the trust formed by the Board for the construction, said that the Dean, Architecture, Jamia Millia Islamia, S.M Akhtar will be designing the mosque in Ayodhya to be constructed by the UP Sunni Waqf Board in the alternate place given by the government against the Babri Masjid.
Akhtar has been in Jamia Millia Islamia since 2003, and has been five times dean of the Department of Architecture in the university. Formerly, he worked independently as a consultant in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.
Talking about his experience, Akhtar says, “My designs have a diversity. I design architecture as per the needs and desires of people. I have also published a book on the subject. My core interest is to find out where Islamic architecture is moving now. My work defies traditional nostalgic images and is more about contemporary Islamic projects.
The belief that only medieval dome shaped architecture is Islamic is nostalgia. Since Islam is a religion, no obsolete period’s architecture can be considered Islamic, as it is ever evolving.”
