Rules Concerning Graveyards 17item The Water and Electricity Board intends to harness the power of water in generating electricity by building a number of dams. Among these projects is building a dam across the Karoon River. The area, which will be flooded by the dam lake, contains an old cemetery. Going ahead with the project is dependent on tearing down the graves in this cemetery. What is your view on the matter? Funeral directors prevent the digging of new graves beside some existing ones. Is there a shar‘ī reason for that? Are they justified in what they are doing? A 35-year-old cemetery was demolished by the Council and turned into a public park. During the era of the previous regime, a number of buildings were erected on the land of the cemetery. Is it permissible for the competent authority to rebuild such facilities? A person donated a piece of land to be used as a burial ground and made it a public cemetery for Muslims. Is it permissible for the board of trustees to charge people a fee for burying their dead there? As a mark of respect for the martyrs, who were residents of our village and are buried elsewhere, it is planned to install memorial stones carrying their names in the village cemetery. Is this permissible? Is it permissible to build a masjid on the land of a derelict cemetery, especially when it is not known whether or not it is held in trust? Is it permissible for the visitors of one of the holy shrines to park their cars inside a century-old cemetery that is no longer used as a burial ground? A piece of land has been a burial ground since a century ago. A few years ago, excavations in the land revealed the ashes and bones of the dead. Is it permissible for the Council to sell this land? By virtue of a court order, a person came to own a piece of land situated beside the cemetery that is no longer capable of accommodating more graves. Is it permissible to use the land for burial of the dead, after securing permission of the landlord? A piece of land was endowed for burying the dead. The cemetery contains the graves of one of the descendants of the Imams (a.s.) and some martyrs. Since there is no suitable land to use by the youth for outdoor sporting activities, is it permissible to use the graveyard for this purpose provided that Islamic code of practice is upheld? Is it permissible to open up a walkway for pedestrians through the cemetery where it could lead to removing a number of twenty-year-old graves? The area where we live is in need of a masjid or a health centre. There are no lands available to build any of these two projects, apart from an unused piece of land that belongs to the cemetery. It is intended that the proceeds from leasing the piece of land to these public services be spent for the needs of the cemetery itself. Is it permissible to lease this land, especially since nothing is known about the specific nature of holding it in trust? There is a plot of land that is adjacent to an existing cemetery. There seems to be no sign of any graves in the said land. However, at some stage in the past, it might have been a cemetery. Is it permissible to have disposal over this land by building a facility for social services? Due to the non-availability of a piece of land in the town centre to build an information centre on it, is it permissible to build the centre in the derelict part of an old cemetery? We have planned to build a medical centre on a piece of derelict land situated on the periphery of the cemetery. However, we could not absolutely conclude that the land was not used, sometime in the past, as a burial ground. This is borne out by the fact that the residents disagree among themselves one way or the other. What they seem to agree on is that there are dead bodies buried around the piece of land intended for building the medical centre. What should we do? 12