The adhan is the call to announce that it is time for a particular obligatory Salah (ritual prayer). Muslims in Paterson, New Jersey, will be allowed to recite the Adhan publicly thanks to a new ordinance.

Under the new ordinance, currently being discussed by the city council, mosques will be allowed to use loudspeakers to announce the call to prayer during a 16-hour span.

The ordinance states: “The city shall permit ‘Adhan’, call to prayer’, ‘church bells’ and other reasonable means of announcing religious meetings to be amplified between the hours of 6:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. for a duration not to exceed five minutes,” Paterson Times reported. The new ordinance was proposed by Councilman Shahin Khalique on Tuesday night. The council members will consider the measure for preliminary approval next Tuesday, Feb 25th.

Paterson has approximately 30,000 Muslims, with dozen mosques scattered throughout the city.

Currently, mosques make the call to prayer five times a day, but the sound is not amplified outside the buildings.

Muslims in the West often face hassles in making the call to prayer, with local authorities arguing that the call would cause noise disturbance to residents. In the Netherlands where freedom of religion is protected by the Constitution, it is allowed for all religions to call its believers to worship by a law regulated in 1980.Under the law, the municipalities can limit the duration and volume of the adhan, but cannot ban it.

Source: AboutIslam.net