Ahmadiyyat - The Renaissance of Islam — Page 344
344 AHMADIYY AT where their need was most urgent. In this manner the scheme has so multiplied itself since its initiation in 1970 that by now the financial outlay alone has exceeded a quarter of a million pounds at a modest estimate. The schools also are doing very good work and are being steadily multiplied. Fortunately the governments of the countries concerned have been most co-operative, helpful and appreciative of the service that the Movement has so eagerly and enthusiastically rendered and is rendering to their people as a practical expre~sion of the bonds of brotherhood that operate to hold the whole of humanity together. In one or two instances red-tape held up the initiation or the progress of units of the scheme, but the persistent efforts of the workers of the Moyement, helped by the prayers of the Khalifatul Masih, succeeded within a short time in overcoming the obstructions put up by the official- dom concerned. Altogether the success achieved by the Nusrat Jehan Scheme has been most encouraging and gratifying and the Movement is now accepted in the countries concerned as an extremely beneficent dispensation. At several places the insti- tutions established by the Movement have had to operate in beneficent competition with Ch~istian missionary institu- tions. In everyone of those cases the institutions of the Movement, starting years later than their rivals and working initially under a complexity of handicaps, soon overtook their rivals and have by now left them far behind in several instances. It is beginning to be realized in Christian Mission- ary circles that Islam and not Christi~nity would ultimately prevail in West Africa. The Nusrat Jehan Scheme limited originally to three years has by now become permanent, and it is expected that its activities will soon begin to be expanded into the neighbouring countries of West Africa. While the success of the scheme in everyone of the countries in which it has been in operation has been most gratifying, perhaps its impact has been most striking, from a certain point of view, in the smallest of those countries, namely Gambia. That country is not only the smallest but was also the most