Mohammed Haji Omar Bhoja passed away. – (M. H. Omar)

JANAAZA NOTICE

‎إِنَّا لِلَّهِ وَإِنَّآ إِلَيْهِ رَٰجِعُون
Inna Lillahi Wa’inna Ilaihi Raji’oon

Mohammed Haji Omar Bhoja passed away.

Husband of Zahara Haji Omar
Father of Aslam Omar, Ashroff Omar, Shahida Hamid, Farhat Kassim, Feroz Omar and Tarab Ismail.
Father In Law of
Mariam (Shezadhi), Seema, Amina, Hamid Tayoob, Farook Kassim, & Iqbal Ismail.

May the Almighty Allah forgive his sins, elevate his ranks and grant him eternal peace in Jannat-ul-Firdaus.
Ameen.

Janaaza will leave residence 116, Barnes Place, colombo 7. at 10.30 am for Maligawatte.

JANAAZA MESSAGE FROM FAMILY MEMBERS.

The Legend Of  MR. M.H OMAR – 

If one were to recall the point of time when M.H. Omar struck gold was when he bought over a beat up plastic company called Nayagams from the state in 1976. It was a big risk and those close to him wondered what
would happen if he couldn’t come with the one hundred thousand smackers installments. He would tell them, in his nonchalant way, the state wouldn’t ‘kill’ him if he didn’t come up with the money. All what they would do is take back the factory and that would be the end of the matter.

Legend of our times

M. H. Omar started his life in humble settings. He worked as a textile broker and then as an announcer at Radio Ceylon, a station very popular in the 60s for Hindi songs.

He established his first textile shop, Firoz Ltd in the main trading hub of colombo, (where he still works from). Well know in the community for his appetite for Risk and Long term Vision. From textiles, he expanded to plastics and then Apparels Manufacturing. Today, he along with his 3 sons, have built a vast business empire. His statetagic vision to allow his sons to independently handle operations has grown the company into one of the largest private conglomerates in Sri Lanka and the Largest Apparel Exporter of the island.

Lovingly known as Major to his friends, M.H. Omar to most others, he is MH Uncle to the Far East Chapter.
We’ve always admired him as our Trustee and looked upto him for Leadership and Guidance. But now he has elevated our pride to next level with his unprecedent contribution to the WMO. For memons of Sri Lanka, he is a monument of a man and a legend of our times.

– Mr Ashraf Sattar
Deputy Chairman of Board of Trustees (WMO)

M.H. Omar is one of those rare entrepreneurs who do exceptionally well when operating out of their comfort zone. The derring-do in him saw to it that Nayagams, now renamed Phoenix Industries, rose literally from the ashes, after the bird it was named after. The plastic products the company produced soon became a household name and before long the company’s income rose exponentially enabling M.H. Omar to invest in other ventures which were way beyond the imagination of your average ‘Pettah Merchant’.

In 1976 M.H. Omar bought over a failing garment factory in Hulftsdorp in Colombo and within a short period of time turned it around into an export orientated factory. This was no mean task since the machinery available at both Lux Shirts and M.K.C. Industries, a hosiery plant which he had taken over previously, was old and decrepit. But it was his philosophy to make good use of the resources at hand and then go in for new machinery.

It was with this ‘resource’ that Lux Shirts rst exported garments to the U.S. This was not a successful or profitable project but it paved the way for new ideas. This was the stepping stone to M.H. Omar’s signature project – Brandix Lanka Limited. Today ‘Brandix’ is the leading exporter of garments in Sri Lanka and has occupied the number one slot for many years now.

The company employs over 45,000 persons and is one of the largest, if not the largest, employee based company. Seated in his once at Firoze Limited in Second Cross Street, in Pettah M.H. Omar, the octogenarian is still a busy man. Blessed with both wealth and splendid health he keeps himself occupied with one trade or another. More recently he went into the gem trade and perhaps the frst thing you’ll see when you enter his plush once is a copy of the license issued by the Gem Corporation permitting him to indulge in the gem trade of which he knew hardly anything. But by catching the tiger by the tail he says he has got the hang of the finer points of the trade.

M.H. Omar is a multi faceted man. You might call him a man for all seasons if you are a movie but like him. He is a
voracious reader and even today he cannot go to bed without reading some book or the other. He is an avid cricket fan and if you were to walk into his once when an international match is on he would be watching it on the huge TV fixed to the wall opposite his desk all the while listening to classical Indian/Pakistani music on his lap top. Not many of his genres in the Memon community in Colombo know how to operate a computer. The very fact that he does goes to show his insatiable thirst to learn new things and keep abreast of what’s going on around in the world.

A foreword by WMO Trustee, Mr Farook Kassim about his maternal uncle and father in law, Mr. MH Omar.
The year was 1966 and I had just celebrated my 8th birthday. Uncle Major, as he was popularly known, was our
neighbor. A distinct memory I have of that time is our family returning home after performing Haj. We brought back with us, the latest electronic gadgets, unheard of in our city but the irony was we did not know how to operate most of them. Uncle Omar was the one who patiently taught us how they all worked.

Sometimes on the weekends, he used take his children and my siblings fishing, either to the Beira Lake or the Breakwaters at Colombo Port. I always remember him as a kind, loving, very confident and entrepreneurial man. He did not hesitate to try out any new business venture. He lived by the belief – that any failure is only a stepping stone to success. He has been my role model in business and an inspirational figure in my life. I always aspire to be like him. A great mind, a mighty heart and a generous soul…my Uncle Major, the legendary MH Omar.

If that was all to say about M.H. Omar then the story would end here. But then that’s not all. Not many have seen the ‘socialist’ in him. Generous to a fault, he has helped many individuals and many causes. His pet project is to supply drinking water to villages in Sri Lanka under his the banner ‘Water is Life’. Over the years he has provided many villages with wells but not that many outside the project know the charitable deeds he has done and continues to do. Modesty prevents him from speaking of the virtuous deeds he has carried out to alleviate the sufferings of the underprivileged.

An incurable optimist, M.H. Omar encourages youth to be smart. He runs an education fund which has helped many students complete their studies. Some of them, today, occupy top posts in the commercial and academic fields. One thing is sure. He would never tell you their names. M.H. Omar is fond of encouraging youth of all hues to prepare themselves – indeed ‘arm’ themselves – for the future with a sound education. ‘Things’ he says, ‘are
going to change and the youth must be ready, able and willing to pick up the gauntlet’. He often quotes the South African freedom fighter Steve Biko who said ‘Change the way you think and things will not be the same’.
Mrs. Seema Omar, daughter in law of Mr. M H Omar gives us an insight on her visionary father in law.

My husband had gone to Germany on an extended business trip, being away from home for a whole month. This was in the first year of my marriage, in 1986, much before idd calls and cell phones became the norm. My father-in-law came home for lunch one day soon after my husband had left, and said he had spoken to Ashroff and how Ashroff had said to please send Seema on the next plane to Germany. I knew he was joking and I said – Pe, if he was to say that, I would not want for anything else in this world and in response to that my father-in-law said to me – he will never say it, but you will have to understand it. In all these years of my marriage, that is one piece of wisdom that I have never forgotten and which has stood me in very good stead!

I have always known my father-in-law to be a fearless, outspoken man who never felt any need to adjust his opinions for the sake of anyone else. This is truly reflected in the way he does charity. Having studied how many memon foundations started successfully but collapsed along with their founders, he modeled the M.H. Omar foundation on the foundations in the west which continued to grow long after their founders were long dead and gone. In order to do this, he has ensured that the M.H.O. foundation generates an income, from which a part is used in service to the community, and the rest is used to help the foundation grow so its income can be augmented, and the scope of its service widened with the passage of time. When I asked him what was his favorite way of doing charity, his reply was, education, education and more education. He has little patience for religious doctrines unless they make sense to his very practical mind. His philosophy around charity is that if we dole out funds indiscriminately, we rob people of their dignity and stunt their potential. Instead he advocates
that we invest money in teaching skills and developing people to become employable, and then build businesses
that create employment for them.

source : WMO_Newsletter