Chair­man of the Mus­lim So­cial and Cul­tur­al Foun­da­tion In­shan Ish­mael says it is not nec­es­sary to shift the cur­few time be­yond 9 pm to ac­com­mo­date Ra­madan prayers. While of­fi­cials of the An­ju­man Sun­nat-ul-Ja­maat (AS­JA) and the Trinidad Mus­lim League (TML) have called for the time to be ex­tend­ed to 9.30 pm or even 10 pm, Ish­mael ex­pressed a dif­fer­ent view. "The prayer that is be­ing af­fect­ed is not com­pul­so­ry and is al­so con­sid­ered a per­son­al prayer so pray­ing at home will still reap great re­wards," he said. "Yes, it may not be as re­ward­ing as pray­ing in con­gre­ga­tion but God knows your heart. "Al­so sev­er­al op­tions are avail­able, one does not have to read the en­tire Qur'an in this month-short­er recita­tions can be done in the in­ter­est of time."

Ish­mael said Mus­lims who were stay­ing the last ten nights of Ra­madan at masjids through­out the coun­try did not have to wor­ry about sus­te­nance, since many of them break fast with those who at­tend the If­tars."I can tell you as a mat­ter of fact, Mus­lims in Trinidad and To­ba­go have no prob­lem with get­ting food, es­pe­cial­ly dur­ing this pe­ri­od," he said. "Al­so, there is am­ple time to pro­vide food, ac­tu­al­ly a huge win­dow. If the food gets cold just mi­crowave." Ish­mael ex­pressed the view that the cur­few from 9 pm to 5 am did not in­ter­fere with Mus­lim be­liefs and free­dom to prac­tise. He said some of the largest con­gre­ga­tions made ad­just­ments to their times and were fin­ished by 8.30 pm.