The purpose of this paper is to provide a conceptual discussion and analysis of the COVID-19 impact on gharimin (debtors) during the pandemic and the recovery support provided by zakat institutions and Islamic financial institutions. The data were qualitatively analysed to explore the different interpretations of gharimin from the Shariah perspective and the current practices in Malaysian zakat institutions. The pandemic COVID-19 has created a sudden health crisis and the number of gharimin increased and was measured as one of the most vulnerable groups especially when the government announced the lockdown period. Hence, many organizations in Malaysia have distributed the zakat fund among the poor and needy as the major recipients. However, there is no dedicated zakat allocation for gharimin to reduce their risk of defaults and non-performing financing problems. Therefore, the finding of this study formulates a new collaboration model to be adopted by zakat institutions and Islamic financial institutions in supporting the gharimin recipients to pay off the debt and survive their basic needs during the pandemic in Malaysia. It is expected to enhance the distribution of zakat among gharimin and assist zakat institutions to identify them as eligible zakat recipients. Further research will examine the reliability of the proposed model as well as its practical implementation in both institutions.
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