2022-03-31-accounts - Islamic Crescents Observation For The UK (Icouk)

This text was generated using OCR and may contain errors. Check the original PDF to see the document submitted to the regulator.

Trustees' Annual Report for the period

Period start date Period end date Day Month Year Day Month Year From 01 04 2021 To 31 03 2022

Section A Reference and administration details

Charity name ISLAMIC CRESCENTS OBSERVATION FOR THE UK (ICOUK)

Other names charity is known by MOON SIGHTING UK, ICOUK

Registered charity number (if any) 1181887

Charity's principal address Beetle Bank Farm Moor Lane, Murton York Postcode YO19 5XD

Names of the charity trustees who manage the charity

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20	Trustee name	Office (if any)	Dates acted if not for whole year	Name of person (or body) entitled to appoint trustee (ifany)
	Qamar Uddin	Chair
	Suliman Gani
	Yusuf Mota
	Rahma Alfarsy

Names of the trustees for the charity, if any, (for example, any custodian trustees)

Name Dates acted if not for whole year

March 2012

TAR

Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)

Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)	Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)	Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)
Type of adviser Name Address




Name of chief executive or names of senior staff members (Optional information)

Section B Structure, governance and management

Description of the charity’s trusts

Type of governing document

(eg. trust deed, constitution)

Constitution

How the charity is constituted Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) (eg. trust, association, company)

Trustee selection methods Selection by the Trustees (eg. appointed by, elected by)

Additional governance issues (Optional information)

You may choose to include additional information, where relevant, about:

policies and procedures adopted for the induction and training of trustees;
the charity’s organisational structure and any wider network with which the charity works;
relationship with any related parties;
trustees’ consideration of major risks and the system and procedures to manage them.

One of the trustees resigned at the end of the last financial year and triggered the appointment of two new trustees from the start of the new financial year. All the new trustees have been given a copy of the CC guidance, the constitution and the latest full-year financial accounts. The trustees maintain the overall control of the CIO's finances and any costs over five hundred pounds (£500) have to be agreed upon in advance. The cost of travel and subsistence for training is limited to one hundred pounds (£100). The CIO does not own/rent any offices for its activities, but the trustees use their home-office freely for all activities.

A London-based moon sighting volunteer group (NCS) has supported the CIO with training some of the volunteers remotely (via Zoom), which continues to encourage more monthly reporting. The trustees have helped them reach wider audiences across the British Isles as they have similar aims to the CIO (i.e. for a United Eid in the UK).

As a result of an increased interest in a UK-only Moon Sighting criteria, there is a risk of a further split at Eid. To mitigate this risk, the CIO will facilitate an adjustment for a dual Hijri Calendar system on the website - and the Mobile Apps until a UK only community consensus is reached.

Section C Objectives and activities

The Objectives of the CIO are to advance the Islamic religion by:

Summary of the objects of the charity set out in its governing document

(a) Reviving the tradition (sunnah) of local moon sighting in the UK, (b) Promoting research of moon sighting for the public benefit, (c) Educating the public on the subject of moon sighting,

(d) Facilitating the establishment of a lunar calendar for the public benefit, (e) Developing and/or using appropriate technology to deliver the above objects.

March 2012

TAR

This is the third report since the registration of the CIO in 2019, but the main activities have been ongoing for a few years. The main aim of the CIO is to establish a workable Hijri calendar in the UK for Islamic worship purposes (eg. start dates of Ramadan and the two Eids). All the activities of Moon Sighting and Reporting are carried out by volunteers (or subscribers to the ICOUK website) from throughout the UK on the last 2-days of each lunar month, taking 1 or 2 hours on each evening (at sunset time), depending on the distance to the locations. The above nationwide activities across the UK are well planned and organised by the trustees, who have specialist skills in all the related Summary of the main subject matters (eg. Islamic Jurisprudence, Astronomy, Technology etc). activities undertaken for the public benefit in relation to The trustees have continually published research articles and training these objects (include within materials on the ICOUK website for the public benefit, as well as offering this section the statutory online training using Remote Learning methods (eg. Zoom Apps). declaration that trustees have had regard to the guidance One of the main sources of reaching the public is the ICOUK website, issued by the Charity which was continually updated with security patches and extensions to Commission on public be easily accessible from any device for sending moon sighting benefit) reports. Unfortunately, the huge demands on the website in recent years (e.g. at Ramadan) occasionally rendered it inaccessible and hence a new upgrade is planned for next financial year to improve user accessibility. To facilitate the establishment of a Hijri Calendar based on Local Moon Sighting requires an efficient Testimony Procedure conducted within a short time after the sunset (from the British Isles). As a result, the trustees have successfully completed a year of monthly Trial Testimony Meetings with volunteers from throughout the UK, rapidly and efficiently. The trustees have also organised conferences, attended TV interviews and facilitated all moon sighting activities as efficiently as possible.

Additional details of objectives and activities (Optional information)

You may choose to include further statements, where relevant, about:

policy on grant making;
policy programme related investment;
contribution made by volunteers.

The CIO works on a totally voluntary basis and the volunteers do not receive any expenses or refund of local transport costs. They give freely and willingly of their time and experience to share the joy of sighting the first crescent moon on the UK horizon, often in bad weather conditions. The monthly moon sighting dates are published in advance with the predicted crescent visibility data from the HMNAO website (Websurf). The past 4-years observation data indicated that the UK Moon Sighting fully meets the Islamic (Hijri) calendar rules of 29 and 30 days/month. Therefore, the trustees have sent a question ( Istiftaa ) to a number of major Islamic Seminaries (Darul Ulooms) to review the above data for permission to adopt UK-only Moon Sighting criteria for United Eids. The responses received (by March 2022) were encouraging and hence the trustees hope to carry out a wider community consultation exercises (through seminars and conferences) to reach a majority consensus on Local Moon Sighting criteria for United Eids in future, InshaAllah.

The trustees consider that the activities undertaken provide benefit to the communities they support and confirm that in exercising their powers and duties, they have complied with their duty to have due regard to the guidance on public benefit published by the Charity Commission and have complied with their duties under Section 17 of the Charities Act 2011.

March 2012

TAR

Section D Achievements and performance

Summary of the main achievements of the charity during the year

The importance of Local Moon Sighting to establish a Hijri Calendar is unanimously agreed by most UK Muslim Scholars as a communal obligation ( Fard Al-Kifaya ). However, the persistent cloudy weather in the UK throughout the year during the past decades has forced the UK Muslims to borrow the Moon Sighting reports from foreign countries, such as Morocco (1970’s) and Saudi Arabia (1980’s), which are often contradictory and leads to confusion/division at Ramadan and two Eids.

The UK weather has improved significantly in recent years and the trial Moon Sighting observations carried out by the trustees and volunteers shown that indeed the first day’s crescent moon can be sighted in the UK throughout the year provided enough people are looking for the moon from different places to overcome the clouds but on the correct date, time and the direction (which charges widely every month with the earth’s tilt). It can be seen from the ICOUK website data that the CIO has carried out 24 days of sighting in the past 12 lunar months (2-days/month) during the reporting period (from 1/4/2021 to 31/3/2022) and the first day’s crescent moon was SEEN in 10 out of 12 months (83.3%), yet maintaining 6 x 29[th] and 6 x 30[th] days/month, which continues to be very impressive in the history of the UK moon sighting record. These impressive results were made possible by more volunteers looking for the moon from different areas and counting the start of the month from the UK Moon Sightings!

It is a tribute to the CIO trustees who have been able to mobilise the public throughout the UK to maintain the sighting locations to over 115 which is slightly lower than the previous year (during the lockdown). The above data continues to demonstrate that a UK-only moon sighting based Hijri Calendar is certainly possible and could be made reliable with wider community support to overcome the UK adverse weather condition.

The above impressive results were achieved by regular training and publicity via the ICOUK website, Social Media channels (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc), Email Newsletters/Mailing List to all subscribers, “Spot the Moon Competition” prizes and training videos/guides as well as providing Location’s data on the ICOUK website for most of the UK cities.

March 2012

TAR

Section E Financial review

No significant reserve

Brief statement of the charity’s policy on reserves

Details of any funds materially in deficit

N/A

Further financial review details (Optional information)

You may choose to include additional information, where relevant about:

the charity’s principal sources of funds (including any fundraising);
how expenditure has supported the key objectives of the charity;
investment policy and objectives including any ethical investment policy adopted.

The principal sources of the CIO fundings come from the donations from the volunteers, such as to update the website or the mobile phone apps.

However, the CIO anticipates major upgrade costs coming up in the near future and hence has reduced some of the regular maintenance costs for future investments, except for training related costs such as organising conferences (eg. printing roll-up banners, fatawa translation fees etc.).

In general, whenever there is a need to raise funds for a particular project many of the volunteers come forward willing and send donations to the CIO bank account. Hence, the CIO is able to meet all financial obligations satisfactorily (without external fundraising), Alhamdulillah.

Section F Other optional information

Section G Declaration

The trustees declare that they have approved the trustees’ report above.

Signed on behalf of the charity’s trustees

Signature(s)

Full name(s) Qamar Uddin (K. Miah)

Position ( eg Secretary, Chair, etc ) Chair (of Trustees)

Date 25/8/2022

March 2012

TAR

Charity Name	No (if any)
ISLAMIC CRESCENTS OBSERVATION FOR THE UK(ICOUK)	1181887
Receipts andpayments accounts		CC16a
01/04/2021 Period start date To For the period from	31/03/2022 Period end date

Section A Receipts and payments	Section A Receipts and payments
A1 Receipts	Unrestricted funds to the nearest £	Restricted funds to the nearest £	Endowment funds to the nearest £	Total funds to the nearest £	Last year to the nearest £
Donations - General	2,401		-	2,401	4,450
			-	-	-
			-		-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
*Sub total*(Gross income for AR)	2,401	-	-	2,401	4,450

A2 Asset and investment sales, (see table).
	-
	-				-
*Sub total*	-				-
*Total receipts* A3 Payments
					4,450

General Expense	618	-	-	618	-
TrainingCourse Expenses	829	-	-	829	-
Website/Apps Develop/Maintenance	255	-	-	255	-
	-		-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
	-	-	-	-	-
**Sub total **	1,702	-	-	1,702	-

A4 Asset and investment purchases, (see table)
	-
	-
**Sub total **	-				-
*Total payments* *Net of receipts/(payments)* A5 Transfers between funds A6 Cash funds last year end *Cash funds this year end*
					-

	699	-	-	699	4,450
		-	-	-	-
	4,450	-	-	4,450	-
	5,149	-	-	5,149	4,450

CCXX R1 accounts (SS)

26/08/2022

Section B Statement of assets and liabilities at the end of the period

Details *Total cash funds* (agree balances with receipts and payments account(s)) Details Held in HSBC Bank Held in PayPal Account	Unrestricted funds to nearest £	Restricted funds to nearest £	Endowment funds to nearest £
	5,112		-
	37		-
	-	-	-
	5,149	-	-
			OK
			Endowment funds to nearest £
N/A	-	-	-
	-	-	-
	-	-	-
	-	-	-
	-	-	-
	-	-	-
Details	Fund to which asset belongs	Cost (optional)	Current value (optional)
N/A		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
Details	Fund to which asset belongs	Cost (optional)	Current value (optional)
N/A		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
		-	-
Details	Fund to which liability relates	Amount due (optional)	When due (optional)
N/A		-
		-
		-
		-
		-
Signature	Print Name Qamar Uddin (K. Miah)
			Date of approval
	Qamar Uddin (K. Miah)		25/08/2022

CCXX R2 accounts (SS)

26/08/2022