His manager steals money from work

11-5-2016 | IslamWeb

Question:

Assalaamu alaykum. I have a question. I work for a place where the budget is allocated by the government (public money). I am in charge of organising courses, filling in forms, plane tickets, hotels and all the procedures for a delegation to travel in order to participate in meetings, conferences, tournaments, or courses. My question is: I am responsible for doing and arranging all things except for financial affairs; I am not responsible to pay, the office bears all expenses for the delegations, I know that the manager of this office will steal the money by changing the invoices and not giving the right invoice to the ministry of finance. He replaces the right invoice by another one that has a bigger amount of money. Now, even if I do not bring those (false) invoices and he will change them by himself, will I be sinful because I am responsible to arrange all things? Do I need to leave this job or not? Please clarify this for me because I do not want my income to be halal instead of haram. Wassalaam.

Answer:

All perfect praise be to Allaah, The Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allaah and that Muhammad  sallallaahu  `alayhi  wa  sallam ( may  Allaah exalt his mention ) is His slave and Messenger.

What you are obliged to do is to carry out the work duties assigned to you in the best manner possible. If you happened to witness any violations being committed, then you should advise the person who commits them wisely and in a good manner; hopefully, he will stop and repent to Allaah. If he refuses to listen to your advice or you could not advise him directly or through any mediator, then you should report the violation to the concerned authority in order to put an end to that injustice, give each his due, and punish the offender.

You bear no sin for that, and you are not obliged to quit your work for the reason that you mentioned. If you do what you have to do, you are not to be blamed or harmed for the misguidance of those who have gone astray. Allaah, The Exalted, says (what means): {O you who have believed, upon you is (responsibility for) yourselves. Those who have gone astray will not harm you when you have been guided. To Allaah is your return all together; then He will inform you of what you used to do.} [Quran 5:105]

Shaykhul-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah  may  Allaah  have  mercy  upon  him wrote, "If the Muslim does his duty of enjoining what is good and forbidding what is evil and does his other duties as well, then the misguidance of those who have gone astray will not harm him."

Allaah knows best.

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