Thousand Lights is a multi-domed

mosque A mosque (; from ar, مَسْجِد, masjid, ; literally "place of ritual prostration"), also called masjid, is a place of prayer for Muslims. Mosques are usually covered buildings, but can be any place where prayers ( sujud) are performed, ...

Anna Salai Anna Salai (), formerly known as St. Thomas Mount Road or simply Mount Road, is an arterial road in Chennai, India. It starts at the Cooum Creek, south of Fort St George, leading in a south-westerly direction towards St. Thomas Mount, and end ...

Chennai Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a States and union territories of India, state in southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, tenth largest Indian state by area and the List of states and union territories of India ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, is one of the largest mosques in the country and is a revered place of worship and azadari for

Shia Shīʿa Islam or Shīʿīsm is the second-largest Islamic schools and branches, branch of Islam. It holds that the Prophets and messengers in Islam, Islamic prophet Muhammad in Islam, Muhammad designated Ali, ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib as his S ...

Muslims in the city.

History

The mosque was built in 1810 by

Arcot Nawab The Carnatic Sultanate was a kingdom in South India between about 1690 and 1855, and was under the legal purview of the Nizam of Hyderabad, until their demise. They initially had their capital at Arcot in the present-day Indian state of Tamil ...

Umdat ul-Umara Ghulam Husain Ali Khan (8 January 1748 – 15 July 1801) aka Ghulam Hussainy or Umdat ul-Umra, was the Nawab of the Carnatic state in the Mughal Empire from 1795 to 1801. He was actually named by his grandfather, Anwaruddin Khan, as "Abdu ...

. It was constructed in medieval architecture. The site of the mosque was previously occupied by an assembly hall. There was a tradition of lighting thousand oil lamps to illuminate the assembly hall. The mosque thus gets its name from this tradition. The chief Shia Qazi of Chennai functions from the mosque, and the post has been continuously held by the same family.

References

External links

chennai.org.uk

indiafascinates.com
Mosques in Chennai Religious buildings and structures completed in 1810 Shia mosques in India {{India-mosque-stub