Khurshid Ahmad

Khurshid Ahmad was a Pakistani economist, philosopher, and politician who helped establish Islamic economic jurisprudence as an academic discipline. He served as a long-standing worker for the Jamaat-e-Islami party and co-founded The Islamic Foundation in Leicester, UK. Throughout his life, he authored or edited more than 70 books in English and Urdu.

Early life and education

Ahmad was born into an Urdu-speaking family in Delhi, British India, on 23 March 1932. He attended the Anglo-Arabic College in Delhi before the partition of India in 1947 forced his family to move to Lahore, Punjab. In 1949, he enrolled at Government College University to study business and economics. At age 17, he published his first English article in the Muslim Economist.

He earned a BA with first-class honours in Economics in 1952. During this period, he began studying the philosophical works of Abul A'la Maududi and joined the Jamaat-e-Islami party. After taking the bar exam in 1952, he entered a law programme at GCU that focused on Islamic jurisprudence. He eventually left the university to avoid mass arrests of party workers by the Punjab Police Department—a move that led him to settle permanently in Karachi.

Ahmad enrolled at the University of Karachi and obtained an MSc with Honours in Economics in 1958. His thesis defended the fundamental work of Adam Smith regarding capitalism and the invisible hand. He later graduated with an MA with honours in Islamic studies from the same university in 1962. After winning a scholarship in 1965, he moved to the United Kingdom to pursue doctoral studies at the University of Leicester.

He joined the Faculty of Economics for his research and successfully defended his PhD thesis on Islamic economic jurisprudence in 1968. In 1970, Leicester University recognized his services to literacy by granting him an honorary doctorate in Education. He then moved to England permanently to teach contemporary philosophy within the department of philosophy at Leicester University.

Career

Ahmad was a senior conservative figure who served as a policy adviser during the Zia administration. While chairing the Planning Commission in the 1980s, he focused on the Islamisation of the national economy. He remained active in politics and successfully ran for the Senate in the 2002 general elections under the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal platform. His tenure in the Senate lasted until 2012.

His academic and literary output included diverse titles such as "Islam and the West" published in 1957 and "Socialism or Islam" released in 1969. He also translated works by Syed Abul ʻAla Mawdudi, including "Toward Understanding Islam" in 1960. As an editor, he contributed to "Elimination of Riba from the Economy" in 1994. His intellectual influence spanned several decades across both Pakistan and the United Kingdom.

Personal life

Ahmad died in Leicester, England, on 13 April 2025, at the age of 93. His funeral took place the following day, 14 April, at the Saffron Hill Cemetery in Leicester.

Awards and recognition

The scholar received the King Faisal Award for Service to Islam in 1990. On 23 March 2011, he was awarded the Nishan-e-Imtiaz, which is Pakistan's highest civil award.