Asghar Ali Engineer

Asghar Ali Engineer
Engineer in 2010
Engineer in 2010
Born(1939-03-10)10 March 1939
Salumbar, Kingdom of Mewar, British India
(now in Rajasthan, India)
Died14 May 2013(2013-05-14) (aged 74)
Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
OccupationWriter, activist
Notable awardsRight Livelihood Award (2004)
Children2

Asghar Ali Engineer (10 March 1939 – 14 May 2013) was an Indian reformist writer and social activist.[1] Internationally known for his work on liberation theology in Islam, he led the Progressive Dawoodi Bohra movement. The focus of his work was on communalism and communal and ethnic violence in India and South Asia. He was a votary of peace and non-violence and lectured all over world on communal harmony.[2]

Engineer also served as head of the Indian Institute of Islamic Studies Mumbai, and the Centre for Study of Society and Secularism (CSSS), both of which he founded in 1980 and 1993 respectively.[3][4] He also made contributions to The God Contention,[5] a website comparing and contrasting various worldviews. Engineer's autobiography A Living Faith: My Quest for Peace, Harmony and Social Change was released in New Delhi on 20 July 2011 by Hamid Ansari, the then vice-president of India.[6]

  1. ^ IANS (14 May 2013). "Scholar Asghar Ali Engineer dies at 74". Hindustan Times. Retrieved 14 May 2013.
  2. ^ About Asghar Ali Engineer Archived 19 May 2007 at the Wayback Machine Rutgers University.
  3. ^ Institute of Islamic Studies and Centre for Study of Society and Secularism.
  4. ^ Asghar Ali Engineer gets alternative Nobel[dead link] Indian Express, 2 October 2004.
  5. ^ The God Contention
  6. ^ "Center For Study of Society And Secularism". Csss-isla.com. Retrieved 16 May 2013.