MOST of us have a desire to help our fellow human beings and this is one of the reasons why people generously give to charitable causes.

However, there are a few people who wish to do more than just give to charity and actually succeed in setting up and accomplishing a project to help the needy of this world, serving the needs of a community in a practical and long-term way.

One such person, Alhaj Mohammed Aslam, lives in High Wycombe and is on his way to Pakistan to inaugurate a mosque and nursery school in Liaqatabad, an inner city area of Karachi, supported by the trust which bears his name.

The opening ceremony will be performed next Friday by Sahibzada Ghulam Jeelani, the Imam of the Jamia Mosque in Jubilee Road, High Wycombe, who is travelling to Karachi today as a personal guest of the founder of the trust.

Alhaj (title for one who has performed the pilgrimage to Makkah) Mohammed Aslam of Rutland Avenue, a slightly built 62-year-old bespectacled father of five and grandfather of nine, has lived in the town since the mid 1960s.

He worked in local furniture factories until he set up his own upholstery business in 1980.

However, his greater fame is as a well-known and much appreciated reader of religious poetry in praise of God Almighty and his prophet, known as Naats.

He has a unique voice, which has led to a number of commercial recordings of his Naats.

The proceeds have all been ploughed into the Aslam Trust, which has also received contributions from friends and well-wishers.

But, 90 per cent of all the funds of the trust are from his own pocket; a considerable contribution, when the cost of the project so far is in excess of £100,000.

He is also delighted to recount the generous response of others, who have already agreed to sponsor about 60 children and have agreed to pay £5 per month for the sponsored child's welfare and education for the next five years.

The nursery school will cater for about 200 orphaned or children from needy families, between the ages of four and six years, and it is hoped that classes for older children will commence once the school has started with its first intake on March 1.

The trust has its own instrument of government and a dozen trustees who will oversee the running of the nursery school and the mosque.

The Aslam Mosque is housed in the top two floors of a three-floor building, the ground floor has been developed on a commercial basis, with the rent from the shops paying for most of the running costs of the mosque and the nursery school.

This selfless devotion to helping the needy should be celebrated andserve as a shining example to us all.