A legacy of trust.
A journey of a lifetime.

About Awaisi

A legacy of service, guidance and trust since 1981

In the name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate.

Awaisi Hajj Umra & Tours was founded on service, sincerity and responsibility to the Ummah. Its roots go back to 1981 and to the life and mission of my late father, Al-Haj Khalifa Mohammed Younas Awaisi Qadri Naushahi (rahmatul ʿalayhī).

The founder and his mission

Born in Jhelum, Pakistan, in 1948, my father came to the United Kingdom at the age of fourteen to join his own father. Like many of his generation, he worked long hours in the textile mills of Yorkshire. Alongside this, he devoted himself to spiritual learning and service under the guidance of Pir Syed Mahroof Hussain Shah Arif Qadri Naushahi (rahmatullah alayh) and Pir Syed Abul Qamal Barak Qadri Naushahi (rahmatullah alayh).

In 1981, driven by a deep sense of responsibility to the Muslim community, he founded Jamiyat Tabligh-ul-Islam in Victor Street, Bradford. He taught children, led congregational prayers and became a trusted figure for families seeking religious guidance. From this work grew a natural extension of his mission: helping British Muslims fulfil the sacred obligation of Hajj with dignity, correct understanding and genuine care.

The early years

At a time when organised Hajj travel in the UK was rare and limited to only a handful of operators, my father launched Awaisi Travels from our family home in Bradford. The first group departed by coach from outside Jamiyat Tabligh-ul-Islam on Victor Street. It was a modest beginning, but one rooted in sincerity.

His intention was never profit or status. His focus was always on people: ensuring pilgrims travelled with proper religious guidance, humane treatment and compassion from the moment they decided to go until they returned home.

A true family business

Awaisi Hajj Umra & Tours was built as a family enterprise. My father’s brother, Al-Haj Mohammad Masud, worked closely with him. In 1991, the first office opened in Bradford and served as the operational and community hub for over a decade. As demand grew, a second office was established in Birmingham.

My two sisters ran the Bradford office full-time and travelled with groups, offering dedicated support to female pilgrims. Their presence ensured that women, particularly elderly travellers, had trusted assistance throughout the journey.

I, Saeed Younas, was involved from a young age. My responsibilities ranged from completing visa applications, submitting and collecting passports from embassies, and delivering documents to pilgrims’ homes, to organising transport, assisting with airport check-ins and managing excess luggage. My first Hajj was in 1989, and I travelled as a group leader alongside my father on numerous occasions thereafter. This hands-on involvement shaped my understanding of the responsibility this work carries.

Service beyond travel

From the outset, Awaisi Hajj Umra & Tours offered far more than flights and hotels. Our service included:

• Personal home visits to explain packages and complete paperwork
• Door-to-door collection and return of passports and documents
• Transport arrangements from home or local collection points
• Freshly cooked meals, including Pakistani cuisine, in Makkah, Madinah, Mina and Arafat
• Fully organised Qurbani and ziyarah programmes
• Scholars and learned guides travelling with groups to ensure correct practice and spiritual support

To maintain consistent standards, the company leased a hotel in Madinah, accommodating around 300 pilgrims at a time. This allowed us to control service quality and provide a level of care that pilgrims still remember decades later.

Scale, reach and historic journeys

Between 1981 and 2013, approximately 19,000 pilgrims travelled with Awaisi Hajj Umra & Tours for Hajj, and around 36,000 pilgrims for Umrah. During peak years, particularly between 1987 and 1997, we served between 700 and 1,000 Hajj pilgrims annually.

Beyond Hajj and Umrah, the company organised extensive coach tours across the Middle East, taking groups through Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Iraq and Palestine, allowing pilgrims to visit sites of immense Islamic and historical significance. In recent years, I have personally led groups to Baghdad, with plans to continue tours to Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, India and other historic destinations.

Agents, mentorship and community impact

Over the years, Awaisi Hajj Umra & Tours built a nationwide network of agents and group leaders across the UK, including Middlesbrough, Derby, Birmingham, Dudley, Walthamstow, Luton, Bedford, Newcastle, Glasgow and Edinburgh.

From the early 1990s onward, many individuals who travelled with my father learned the operational side of the business and later established their own agencies. While this naturally created competition, it also expanded access to pilgrimage services across communities. In many ways, this mentorship became part of my father’s wider contribution to the Ummah.

Trusted relationships in Saudi Arabia

Decades of service enabled the business to build strong and trusted relationships with Saudi partners and officials. We worked closely with the Marzuki family in Makkah, major hotel providers near the Misfalah area. These relationships often allowed for streamlined embassy processing, same-day passport collection and special arrangements with Saudi Airlines, including dedicated check-in counters, flexible luggage handling and, on occasion, complimentary first-class allocations for pilgrims.

Reliable muallim and passport-management services during Hajj ensured that group documentation and movement through checkpoints were handled smoothly and responsibly.

Compassion in action

The true spirit of Awaisi Hajj Umra & Tours is best understood through lived examples. On one well-known occasion, a respected scholar from Huddersfield approached my father and explained that he only had £900 to perform Hajj. My father simply replied:

“Bring your passport and the money you have, and prepare to go.”

That scholar completed Hajj without hesitation or humiliation. This was not an isolated incident. My father quietly enabled several individuals to perform Hajj free of charge. Many pilgrims still describe their journey with him as “the best experience of my life”, not because of luxury, but because of how they were treated.

Challenges, trials and resilience

The journey was not without hardship. Increased competition, regulatory changes and the revocation of handling rights for a charter airline in the 1990s caused significant financial loss. The era of manual paperwork and embassy submissions placed enormous pressure on the family.

Later, systemic changes to Hajj processing and overseas administrative failures, including issues affecting Pakistani Hajj routes that left around 67,000 pilgrims unable to travel, also impacted our operations. Despite these challenges, the business endured through patience, unity and commitment.

Loss, transition and leadership

In 2011, my father suffered a major brain haemorrhage and underwent surgery. After rehabilitation, he led his final group in 2013 and passed away in 2015.

I stepped forward to continue the work. In 2015, I led my first tour to Baghdad, followed by Hajj tours from 2016, leading groups of between 40 and 50 pilgrims. The COVID-19 pandemic then brought global travel to a halt. Alongside operational challenges, I faced personal trials, including difficult experiences with competitors and associates. These lessons reshaped my leadership approach. Today, I work only with partners who share our values of integrity, service and accountability.

About me: continuing the trust

I was born in Bradford, UK, and have lived my life here. From childhood, I worked alongside my father in the mosque and within the Hajj business.

Since 1998, my professional career has included roles in corporate banking with the Royal Bank of Scotland Group, social housing and running my own lettings business. I have also worked as a Property Surveyor for a social housing provider, managing a portfolio of homes for prison leavers. I continue to work in the social housing sector, managing a portfolio of social housing.

Alongside my professional career, I have remained committed to community service. I was heavily involved in the conversion and redevelopment of Jamiyat Tabligh-ul-Islam, Howarth Road, Bradford, overseeing fundraising and project management. I also supported the renovation of Jamia Ghausia Mehria, Bradford, through fundraising and project management.

In 2006, I established Homes4Living, a charitable initiative supporting the less fortunate. From 2016, we ran a weekly Sunday food bank serving around 250 people, providing three-course meals regardless of ethnicity, religion or background.

The road ahead

Many in the community tell me, “Your father would be proud of you.” They remember the care, the warmth, the guidance and the way pilgrims were treated as family.

With my family’s continued support, long-standing Saudi relationships and a renewed international vision, Awaisi Hajj Umra & Tours moves forward as both a trusted service and a living legacy.