About the Book

This book tries to remove various cobwebs around Islam and Islamic teachings. Islam has become the centre of controversies today due to some extremist elements in the Islamic world and manipulations by vested interests. There is an urgent need to understand Islam in the right perspective if we have to deal with more than one billion people who profess the faith. It is no easy task and needs not only an in-depth study of Islam but also of current political developments in the Islamic world and various interests working therein.

Dr Engineer strongly advocates that Islam is a religion of harmony, peace and coexistence. While dealing with the life of the Prophet, he depicts Him as a man of non-violence by deep conviction.

About the Author

Dr Asghar Ali Engineer was born in Rajasthan in 1939. He graduated in civil engineering from Indore, Madhya Pradesh and also took training in Hadith, Tawil, Fiqh and Qur’anic Tafsir. He is counted as one of the 500 foremost scholars of Islam in the world. He has published over 50 books on Islam. He is liberal and moderate in his approach and demonstrates Islam as a religion which is far from violence. He strongly advocates Hindu-Muslim unity which, he argues, is suffering due to the misuse of religion for political purpose.

He is a peace activist and is currently leading a reform movement in Bohra Muslim Community. He was awarded the National Communal Harmony Award by Government of India in 1998 and the Right Livelihood Award, also known as Alternate Nobel Award by Swedish Academy, in 2004. He was conferred Honorary Doctorate by Calcutta University in 1993 and Hamdard Islamic University, Delhi in 2005. He is Founding Chairman of Centre for Study of Society and Secularism and Institute of Islamic Studies.