I had the opportunity to offer one Friday namaz at the Jama Masjid in Gaya, Bihar, which gave me enough time to understand the architecture of this mosque. It’s located in Murari Nagar and it’s a landmark in Gaya as Road is also named after Jama Masjid.
I did not find any inscription inside or outside the mosque, which could have given me any information about its builder. It can certainly be guessed that this mosque must have been built about one and a half centuries ago. According to Islamic architecture, this structure is very beautiful and grand, and this important structure has been decorated with simple ornaments to praise God, for which the local architectural style has been used very beautifully.
The main entrance of the mosque is a decorated archway and it’s adorned with two octagonal minarates tops are bulbus and above, kalash is placed. The front wall has a series of small uniform minarates and arches. Both ends are having the minarates similar to the entrance archway is having. After entrance we enter the courtyard and from there there are seven archways to access the prayer hall. The courtyard has the ablution house where we perform the wudhu and washrooms too. Prayer hall is a rectangular hall and the entrance wall has two octagonal minarates at either end similar to the main entrance and from the central archway three three small cylindrical minarates either side. The roof is adorned with domes and Kalash at the peaks. The parapet is decorated with floral motifs.
Western wall centre has an elegant Mihrab and Mimbar for Imam. Who delivers sermon from the Mimbar and prayer from the Mihrab. There is calligraphy work in Arabic which contains the verses from Holy Quran and Hadith.
It’s a place of worship and a tourists attraction as such kind of architectural fusion no where can be witnessed.