Skip to content 
Fulfill your Zakat this Ramadan
Your Zakat is a force for positive change. It directly provides nutritious meals for families, supports Orphans and Helpless Children, delivers clean water, and funds other essential relief efforts.
What is Zakat?
Zakat (zakaat, zakah), or almsgiving, is one of the five pillars of Islam. This means that zakat is mandatory for Muslims, along with the other four sacred pillars of prayer (salah), fasting (sawm), pilgrimage (Hajj) and belief in Allah and His Messenger, Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) (shahadah). For every sane, adult Muslim who owns wealth over a certain amount โ known as the Nisab โ he or she must pay 2.5% of that wealth as zakat.
ย
โโฆand those in whose wealth there is a recognised right, for the needy and deprivedโ (Qurโan 70:24-5)
ย
Eligible Muslims pay zakat once a year, and it is due as soon as one lunar (Islamic) year has passed since meeting or exceeding the nisab (certain amount of wealth). The zakat of every Muslim is then distributed to those who meet the criteria to receive it. At BASMAH, your zakat is distributed with the utmost care to ensure that the most vulnerable, including Orphans & Helpless Children, Clean Water, Rohingya Refugee, Medical Care and Disaster Relief, and more have access to the help that they need.
All BASMAH programs are Zakat-eligible
Zakat is an annual charitable payment that goes on to benefit those in need and is a Religious obligation for Muslims everywhere. Your Zakat is a beautiful pillar of Islam that allows you to care for Orphans & Helpless Children, Clean Water, Rohingya Refugee, Medical Care, Feed the Hungry, Education, and more or even provide emergency aid to those struck by Disaster Relief.
Orphans & Helpless Children
Our
Orphans & Helpless Children sponsorship program provides these children with all the essentials they need to lead fulfilling lives and have prosperous futures.
Clean Water
Water is essential for life. Donate to Basmah's water wells in Bangladeshโ$250 for a standard well or $2,500 for a community well. Change lives, earn endless rewards.
Food for Hungry
Bangladesh where economic inequality, extreme poverty, and food insecurity are rampant. With a population of 164 million and recurrent natural disasters, many people, including children and the homeless, struggle to afford a proper meal.
Education Project
BASMAH fights poverty by providing free education across the Rohingya refugee camp (seven centers) and locations like Jessore, Narayanganj, Nunertek, and Rangpur. They offer full support, including supplies and mental health education, empowering hundreds of children for a sustainable future.
What is nisab?
The nisab is the minimum amount of wealth a Muslim must possess before they become liable to pay zakat. This amount is often referred to as the nisab threshold.
Gold and silver are the 2 values used to calculate the nisab threshold. The nisab is the value of 87.48 grams of gold or 612.36 grams of silver.
Current Nisab Value (Live update)
Using value of silver (612.36 grams) โ approximately $1,028.72
Using value of gold (87.48 grams) โ approximately $11,607.35
Zakat: A sacred pillar
Zakat is not just a fundamental pillar of Islam, it is also a revolutionary concept which can end extreme poverty โ that is the power of zakat!
ย
As Allah (SWT) tells us in the Holy Qurโan:
โAnd be steadfast in prayer and regular in charity: And whatever good you send forth for your souls before you, you shall find it with Allah.โ (Qurโan 2:110)
ย
It is also a right that the poor have over us.
โThose in whose wealth there is a recognised right for the needy and the poor.โ (Qurโan 70:24-25)
Picture this: if just the 10 richest people in the world paid zakat โ that would be a staggering $9.25 billion! The power of that money in tackling poverty would be huge.
When you give zakat to basmah, your donation is used in the most effective way possible to relieve the suffering of the worldโs most vulnerable people.
What is Fitrana?
How much is Zakat?
What are 2 types of Zakat?
The two main types are:
- Zakat Al-Mal, is translated to โthe Zakat of wealthโ and is commonly referred to as Zakat. It refers to the pillar of Islam stating that every sane, adult Muslim who owns wealth over a certain amount โ known as the Nisab, must pay 2.5% of that wealth.
- Fitrana or, Zakat al-Fitr, is a charitable donation of food that must be given before Eid prayer, before the end of the month of Ramadan, for the love of Allah.
How BASMAH use your donation
BASMAH spends your donations in the most effective way possible to relieve the suffering of the worldโs most vulnerable people.
We spend the funds on the first category of zakat โ the poor and needy. As administrators of zakat, we also take a proportion to cover admin costs of distributing aid (e.g the cost of petrol to transport the aid to a remote community). When you make a zakat donation, we take a fixed amount of up to 12.5% in admin fees.
ย
Zakat FAQs
No, zakat is only prescribed for Muslims.
There are eight categories of people who are eligible to receive zakat.
1.The poor
2.The needy
3.Administrators of zakat
4.Those whose hearts have been recently reconciled
5.Those who have been enslaved
6.Those in debt
7.In the cause of God
8.Travellers (including refugees)
A poor person is someone whose property, in excess of his basic requirements, does not reach the nisab threshold. The recipient must not belong to your immediate family, therefore; your spouse, children, parents and grandparents cannot receive your zakat. Other relatives, however, can receive your zakat.
For every year that you owe zakat, take 2.5% from the total wealth you had at the end of that year and pay that in zakat. If you are not sure how much wealth you had, you must estimate it to the best of your ability. E.g. It is now Ramadan 2024. You have not paid Zakat for the last 5 years. You need to work out how much wealth you owned every Ramadan for the last 5 years and pay 2.5% of that.
You can donate your Zakat now or use our Zakat calculator.
Miscellaneous Questions
You must pay zakat with the intention of paying it. Therefore, it is important that you make an intention to give a donation as a zakat payment.
It is to be paid on the total savings regardless of what was paid on it in the past. Therefore, you would pay 2.5% of $10,000, $250.
Miscellaneous Questions: Saving and Jewellery
The majority of the scholars from the past favoured the opinion that it should be paid. This is the same for both the child and the insane person. Therefore, their guardian should take the zakat from the personโs wealth and pay it on their behalf. However, some opinion suggest that it is not due on children and insane people, so please discuss with a scholar.
The best way for you to do this would be to take the jewellery to a jeweller and ask them to value just the gold and silver parts of the jewellery. The valuations they give will be the total on which you have to pay zakat. Precious stones are not liable for zakat.
Miscellaneous Questions: Debt
Miscellaneous Questions: Business and property
For the time that you were renting the house out and did not have the intention of selling, you do not pay zakat on the house. But you would still have to pay it on the rent you earned just like any other wealth you have. You must include it in zakatable assets from the day you made the intention to sell the house. You must also pay it on the selling price of the house. However, if you are paying in advance, you would need to estimate this. You would need to do the same for every year after that in which the house is still for sale. But to be absolutely clear, please discuss this with a scholar.
Every year at the time of paying zakat, you would need to calculate the total bulk selling price for all the goods for sale in your shop. E.g. All the clothes for sale in your shop add up to a total selling value of a particular sum of money. You would add this to your other zakatable wealth when calculating your total payment.