Ventilation in a Mosque - an Additional Purpose the Minarets May Serve

A minaret of a mosque, traditionally used as a high platform to deliver adhan (the call forprayer), has greatly lost its functional significance with the invention of loudspeakers. Despiteof being a functionally redundant element, people still like to erect a minaret as a traditionalsymbol, identity and beauty of a mosque. In this context, a minaret could be more meaningfulif it could serve further practical purposes.As a densely occupied congregational space, a mosque deserves adequate ventilation.Efficiency of cross ventilation through windows is limited to certain plan depths and many ofthe community mosques with huge capacity, exceeds that limit. This paper is intended toexplore the scopes of using the minarets to facilitate ventilation in warm-humid climate,placed in a dense urban set-up, having huge plan depths, with a special reference to those ofDhaka City. Possibilities are explored to use a minaret for up-draft, downdraft and to enhancethe motive force of stack effect basing on principles of thermo-fluid mechanics.