The story of how the Shah Najaf imambara is maintained till this day is very interesting. In Nawab Ghazi-ud Din Haider, the British India company found an easy going and gullible ruler with a lot of money. In 1814, they asked the Nawab for a ‘loan’ of one crore rupees, which was given and then followed with a second ‘loan’ request of another crore the following year. In order to flatter the Nawab and ensure that he continued to extend the line of credit, , they coaxed him to throw off the pretence of Mughal suzerainty, that Awadh rulers always maintained and declare himself ‘Padshah-i-Awadh’ or the ‘King of Awadh’ . In 1826, they again asked the Nawab to invest one crore and fifty lakhs in loan during the Anglo-Burmese war. In this way, the British kept taking huge sums of money from the Nawabs in the form of ‘perpetual’ loans - that were never paid back.

Now the problem was that taking an interest on loans is forbidden in Islam. But the Nawabs also could not forego interest on such huge sums. To get around this, a series of loan agreements were put in place as per which the loans were to be considered perpetual, but the interest would be paid as maintenance for upkeep of religious buildings, for religious ceremonies, as well as pensions to the members of the Nawab’s household. This was known as the ‘Wasiqa system’