Jama Masjid Iqbal-ud-Dowla

Although am not biased at judging against a Masjid to another because in the end its the house of Allah, but this particular one has to have a special mention. The Spanish Mosque (Jama Masjid Iqbal-ud-Dowla) on the Paradise-Old Begumpet Airport Road, and very close to my house in Hyderabad, is a striking mosque with unique plan elevation; it was built by Sir Vikhar-ul-Umra Iqbal-ud-Dowla, the Paigah noble, in 1906.

It is believed to be the only one of its kind in India, with pointed arches, a pointed main roof composed of two truncated octagonal pyramids placed one above the other intervened by octagonal domes. The minarets aesthetically placed at corners of the parapet are in the same style, very unusual from those seen in other mosques in the city and elsewhere. And it is difficult to miss them as you climb on (from Paradise side) to the flyover opposite the Airport.

A lot of debate has been done for its semblance to the architectural look and feel of a church!

The other notable features are Moorish arches inside the prayer hall, Quranic verses in exquisite calligraphy inscribed on the inside walls, the absence of an ablution tank and a courtyard. In plan, the mosque comprises a main prayer hall, two rooms in front of it and a central corridor for entering the hall. It is over this central corridor or the entrance porch that the octagonal dome stands.

The Spanish Mosque here formed part of the sprawling 340 acres of wooded estate of the Paigah nobles studded with seven palaces, all built in European and Indo-European styles. Some of them are the Paigah Palace or the Iqbal-ud-Dowla palace that has now become the Hyderabad Urban Development Authority's office, the Devdi Nazir Nawaz Jung, part of which has been leased to Chiraan Fort Club and the Vikhar Manzil, overlooking the Hussain Sagar Lake.

It is listed for conservation as a Grade II A structure, comprising buildings of regional or local importance possessing special architectural or aesthetic merit, cultural or historical value. They are the local landmarks contributing to the image and identity of the city deserving intelligent conservation and the regulation governing them allows adaptive reuse internally but external changes are subject to scrutiny. Yet the colour scheme of the mosque has been changed from pure white to pastel green in recent years.