Nurflix and Alchemiya: Shariah Compliant Online Streaming Services Seek to Redefine Entertainment
Imams and
Preachers Supervise These Online Entertainment Productions
Main Points:
1. During the
last two years, online streaming services catering to the Muslims have come up.
2. Malaysia's
Nurflix was launched from a mosque.
3. UK's
Alchemiya was co-founded by Ajmal Masroor Akhtar, a London based Imam.
4. Nurflix
produces Shariah compliant drama, religious instruction programmes, programmes
for children and women and Islamic music.
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By
New Age Islam Staff Writer
31 March
2022
Nurflix/Facebook
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For a long
time, Muslims were worried about the corruptive influence of immoral content on
the internet and on online streaming services. These video-on-demand services
offer films that are based on love, sex, violence and promote immorality and
perversion in the society.
Since
internet and media platforms have become a quintessential part of everyday
life, the Muslims cannot keep away from it. Therefore, some people from the
Muslim community started thinking of using the internet and media platforms to
present what they called Islamic entertainment.
The term
Islamic entertainment seems self-contradictory as Islam does not encourage vain
entertainment to pass time. Quran terms vain entertainment as Lahw -al-Hadith
and asks Muslims to abstain from it. But in the modern social milieu,
entertainment provided on internet or other media platforms cannot be avoided.
So some Muslim ideologues who had been in the media or entertainment industry
for some time decided to produce entertainment based on Islamic values so that
Muslims could be kept away from the corruptive influence of the 'non-Islamic'
entertainment. Hence the term Islamic entertainment.
Therefore,
to produce 'Islamic entertainment', Navid Akhtar and Ajmal Masroor Akhtar who
had worked with the BBC, founded Alchemiya, an online streaming service in 2015
keeping Muslim audience in mind. Interestingly, Ajmal Masroor Akhtar is an imam
in a London mosque.
Alchemiya streams most of the content in the English language
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Alchemiya
offers movies, dramas and documentaries which are based on Islamic values. All
its content is in English and it has achieved a multi -country subscriber base.
It was called the Muslim Netflix.
Inspired by
its success, a streaming company iflix was established in Malaysia in 2018. It
was not based on Islamic values and was established on commercial basis. But it
was Malaysia's first indigenous streaming company. Its first drama Nur went on
air in 2018 and had 11 million views. The story of Nur was based on the
forbidden love between a religious preacher Adam and a prostitute named Nur.
The success of Nur prompted the producers to make its sequel Nur 2 in 2019.
In February
2020, Nurflix, a video-on-demand or online streaming service company was
founded in Malaysia. The purpose of the company was to provide 'Islamic'
entertainment to the Muslim masses. The company's stress was on ethics and it
wanted to teach the Muslims morals through comedies and dramas.
Nurflix's
first production was a drama titled Khadijas that was written by the famous
Malaysian writer Hazwani Helmi. It went on air on 22 January 2021. The show was
so successful that the producers claim that the moment it went on air, its
server was jammed.
The
management of Nurflix claim that it is a fully Aqeedah and Shariah compliant
media platform. It has a supervisory committee which is headed by an Islamic
scholar Ustad Raza Ahmad Mukhlis and its advisor is the popular Malaysian
preacher Habib Ali Zainal Abedin al Hamid.
The fact
that may make eye brows raised is that Nurflix's launch was broadcast live on
its Facebook page Nurflix. TV from a mosque in Shah Alam, Selanger and the
event was officiated by preacher Habib Ali Zainal Abedin al Hamid.
Nurflix
offers programmes on various categories like general, women, children etc.
Earlier they had a category on religious preachers but (wisely) dropped it.
Currently
Nurflix has 26000 followers on Instagram and 16000 followers on Facebook. It
has 16000 subscribers.
The CEO of
Nurflix is Syah Rizal Mohammad and its Chairman is Syed Tahir Ali who was
formerly associated with the petroleum firm Petronas and the carmakers Proton
and Perodua. One of its members is Brader Shah who was one of the members of a
famous musical group of Malaysia.
Nurflix
plans to produce 1000 items of content on education, spirituality, motivational
and mainstream categories. It plans to make 12000 episodes of programmes in the
next five years.
However,
given the sectarian divide among the Muslims, it has to be seen how these
streaming companies deal with sectarian issues. Will Nurflix remain neutral or
become a mouthpiece of a particular sect or ideological school? For example, in
September 2021, Nurflix invited a famous Malaysian singer, Aliff Azizi, who had
recently joined the Tablighi Jamaat for a chat session. During the
conversation, Azizi said that joining the Tablighi Jamaat was a good decision
for him.
Alchemiya
of the UK and Nurflix of Malaysia are, therefore, are an attempt to define
entertainment in the modern global perspective where Muslims cannot avoid media
and internet. But whether it is imperative to have imams and preachers to
supervise its contents and launch a streaming platform from a mosque, is a
topic of discussion. Preachers have their sectarian affiliations and many of
them have extremist views on veil, girls' education, blasphemy, dress and
relations with non-Muslims. Therefore, association of religious preachers with
these media platforms may create problems in the long run.
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islamic-culture/nurflix-alchemiya-shariah-entertainment/d/126694
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