A delegation from the Holy Alawi Shrine took part in a special coordination workshop on guidance for lost pilgrims, hosted by the Holy Abbasi Shrine in cooperation with the Lost Pilgrims Guidance Organization of the Holy Shrines and other related institutions.
This participation follows last year’s involvement and comes as part of efforts to strengthen cooperation and coordination among the holy shrines in developing services provided to pilgrims, particularly during the mass pilgrimages that draw millions of visitors.
Mustafa al-Fatlawi, head of the Lost Pilgrims Guidance Center at the Holy Alawi Shrine, told the Shrine’s News Center:
“At this workshop, the delegation of the Holy Alawi Shrine presented an initiative to unify the databases of the lost pilgrims’ guidance centers across the holy shrines through the creation of a shared search interface.”
He added: “This plan has been fully implemented and will be put into service for the first time during the Arbaeen Hussaini ceremonies in order to serve pilgrims. The system will be further developed in the future and will also be used during other mass pilgrimages.”
Al-Fatlawi noted that coordination among the pilgrim guidance centers had until now taken place mainly through phone calls and wireless communications, with no direct virtual connection existing between them, saying:
“This very fact revealed the necessity of introducing this plan in order to upgrade the service mechanism and increase the level of coordination among the institutions providing services.”
He explained that this initiative is designed on the basis of API technology, which enables communication between different databases without the need to merge them into a single unified system. Accordingly, each center can, through its own system, search for information on pilgrims registered at other centers.
For example, the Holy Alawi Shrine can check whether a given pilgrim has been registered at the Holy Hussaini Shrine, the Holy Abbasi Shrine, or other centers located along the pilgrims’ route — a capability that speeds up the process of locating lost pilgrims and significantly enhances coordination among the institutions providing services.
Participants in the workshop welcomed the initiative, considering it an effective step toward improving services provided to pilgrims. They also emphasized the need to further develop this plan and to make use of it during all future mass pilgrimages.
It is worth noting that the Holy Alawi Shrine, mobilizing all of its departments and capacities, is taking part in serving Arbaeen pilgrims — pilgrims who choose the holy shrine of Amir al-Muminin (peace be upon him) in Najaf al-Ashraf as one of the most important spiritual stations on their journey toward Karbala.
