Nejatullah Siddiqui, A Father of Islamic Economics, Passes Away at 91

Indian economist Dr. Mohammad Nejatullah Siddiqi, who was awarded the 1982 King Faisal International Prize for Islamic Studies, passed away suddenly in California. He was 91.

Born in India in 1931, he was educated at Aligarh Muslim University as well as Rampur and Azamgarh. He served as associate professor of economics and professor of Islamic studies at the Aligarh Muslim University and as professor of economics at the King Abdul Aziz University, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, in its Center for Research in Islamic Economics. He later became a Fellow at the Center for Near Eastern Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, and after that a visiting scholar at the Islamic Research & Training Institute, Islamic Development Bank, Jeddah.

He was a prolific writer in Urdu and English. According to WorldCat, he has 63 works in 177 publications in 5 languages and 1,301 library holdings. Several of his works have been translated into Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Indonesian, Malaysian, Thai, etc. Perhaps his most widely read book is Banking without interest which was published in 27 editions between 1973 and 2000 in 3 languages and is held by 220 libraries worldwide.

During his long academic career, he supervised a number of Ph.D. theses at universities in India, Saudi Arabia, and Nigeria. He was associated with a number of academic journals as an editor or advisor. He served on numerous committees and participated in many conferences in various parts of the world. He was very helpful to all and shared his valuable knowledge with society. He lived in Aligarh, India. He was a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Management Studies, at Aligarh Muslim University, India.

Prof. Siddiqui worked for numerous universities all around the world. He continued to teach at Aligarh Muslim University for a considerable amount of time. For his contributions to Islamic Economics, he received the King Faisal Award. He once served on the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind board as well.

He was born in India in 1931, and he attended Rampur, Azamgarh, and Aligarh Muslim University for his education. He taught economics as an associate professor at King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, as well as Islamic studies at Aligarh Muslim University. He was also a member of the Center for Research in Islamic Economics at King Abdul Aziz University.

Later, he served as a fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles’ Center for Near Eastern Studies, and a visiting scholar at the Islamic Development Bank’s Jeddah-based Islamic Research and Training Institute.