Fact Check: Delhi Tourism Department made false claim on Jama Masjid

It has been widely accepted in the general Public that Delhi’s Jama Masjid is the largest mosque in India. Located just 500 meters away from the Red Fort, the construction of Jama Masjid was started by Shah Jahan in the year 1650 with red stones and marble and at that time it took 6 years and 10 lakh rupees to build it.

At the DTC bus stop in the national capital Delhi, you will see hoardings claiming that Delhi’s Jama Masjid is the largest mosque in India.

Dargah Hazrat Nizamuddinؒ bus stop has hoardings with beautiful pictures of Qutub Minar, Akshardham, Parliament and others, including Jama Masjid. The hoarding reads,”Do you know? Jama Masjid is the largest mosque in India”.

According to the website of Alamy, hoardings describing Jama Masjid as India’s largest mosque are installed at Laxmi Nagar bus stop.

Similarly, the website of the Delhi Tourism Department has also claimed about Jama Masjid that Delhi’s Jama Masjid is the largest mosque in India.

Fact Check:

To find out about Delhi’s Jama Masjid, we searched with the help of certain “keywords” to see if it was the most largest mosque in India. Is there any bigger mosque than Jama Masjid? We found a post on Facebook by historian Sohail Hashmi quoting this. “Dear Delhi government, Jama Masjid is not the largest mosque in India. Bhopal’s Taj-ul-Masjid is 33 per cent bigger.”

After Sohail Hashmi’s Facebook post, other media houses including Punjab Kesari, Zee Salaam, Nav Bharat Times and Prabhat Khabar have published reports on this.

Punjab Kesari has said in its report that the Taj-ul-Masjid in Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh, was built between 1868-1901 by Shahjahan Begum, the third woman ruler of Bhopal. Taj-ul-Masjid means ‘Taj of mosques’.

The report further pointed out that Hasan Khan, professor of Darul Uloom of Taj-ul-Masjid, also agrees with Hashmi. “Taj-ul-Masjid is actually the largest mosque in India which is one-third times bigger than Jama Masjid. In fact, in my personal opinion, it is the largest mosque in the world in terms of ‘cover area’. However, combining both the open area and the covered area, Lahore’s Badshahi Mosque built by Aurangzeb is the largest. ”

According to Punjab Kesari, no verified dimension is easily available, but many websites like ‘Culture Trip’ and ‘Hello Travel’ claim that the Taj-ul-Masjid has a seating capacity of 1,75,000 people, while according to Britannica.com, the courtyard of Jama Masjid (Sehn) can seat only 25,000 people.

It is known that on searching – “Jama Masjid, Delhi” on Google, it is revealed that Jama Masjid is one of the grandest and largest mosques in India.

Conclusion:

It is clear from this fact check of DFRAC that the hoardings at the bus stop in Delhi and the claim of the website of the Delhi Tourism Department that Delhi’s Jama Masjid is the largest mosque in India are misleading because in reality India’s largest mosque is The Taj-ul-Masajid of Bhopal.

Claim:  Delhi’s Jama Masjid is india’s largest mosque

Claimed : Delhi Tourism Department, hoardings at bus stops and others

Fact Check: Misleading