PASIR MAS: The Ministry of Home Affairs (KDN) anticipates receiving 150,000 damaged copies of the Quran for disposal from the three states affected by floods during the northeast monsoon.
KDN Enforcement and Control Division secretary, Nik Yusaimi Yussof, said that so far, they have collected 55,000 copies of the Quran from several affected districts in Kelantan, Terengganu, and Kedah.
He said that KDN has established the Ihsan Madani Squad, consisting of 100 members, including volunteers, responsible for helping flood victims, including collecting and replacing damaged Qurans with new ones approved by KDN.
"We have set up collection centres for the Quran at the main mosques in each flood-affected district to facilitate victims in sending their damaged holy books before they are replaced with new ones.
"Additionally, several methods are used to dispose of the Qurans in accordance with Islamic law, including drying, where they are dried and turned into ashes before being formed into cubes to be released into the sea.
"There is also a method of ink removal, where the ink of the Quran is removed from the paper before it is destroyed and recycled into Quran covers and other items," he said during a press conference after inspecting the 'Let's Exchange Quran' (JEQ) programme and flood victims' solidarity at Masjid Taman Maka Utama here today.
Nik Yusaimi said that in Kelantan, they have received 25,000 copies of the Quran from flood victims involving five collection centres in three badly affected districts, namely Pasir Mas, Tumpat, and Bachok.
"However, we have found that there are still parties disposing of the Quran not according to Islamic law, including disposing of them in recycling centres.
"Therefore, the public is urged to exchange their damaged Qurans due to flooding for proper disposal through the JEQ KDN programme," he said.