How to overcome dependence on Usury (also known as Interest or Riba)

But let’s face it: The reality is we all want to expand our businesses and we need capital. So where do we source capital other than Banks??

We do have options and one is equity funding through angel investors or strategic investors. Another is an Islamic finance model based on the principle of profit-sharing. Yet another option is going public to raise the required funds by offering a good proposition for shareholders, in other words a dividend.

But first we must have proof of profitability of our existing enterprise. For this we must have information that is up to date. To give an example from the early history of Islam. When the Prophet reached Medina following the flight from Mecca, the first thing he did was to conduct a census of the population. This is how the early Islamic state was founded, from an alliance of the migrants from Mecca (The Muhajireen) and the inhabitants of Medina (The Ansar).

The Dawoodi Borah community which is a strong mercantile community has also taken a commendable stance in this regard. Their leader many years ago, made a pronouncement that all their businesses must not use any form of Riba and stressed that it was better for his followers to sleep on the road, if necessary, than to do businesses with Riba. This sort of strong statement prompted businessmen dealing in Riba to give it up altogether and resort to alternative avenues of raising funds for their businesses.