Ataullah Siddiqui (died 8 November 2020)[1] was a Muslim scholar and academic who did much to promote interfaith relations.
Ataullah Siddiqui (died 8 November 2020)[1] was a Muslim scholar and academic who did much to promote interfaith relations.
Of Indian origin, Ataullah Siddiqui completed his secondary education in Kalimpong and moved to Britain in 1982.[2] There he became an academic, holding the position of professor of Christian-Muslim Relations and inter-faith understanding and course director of the certificate in Muslim chaplaincy course at Markfield Institute of Higher Education. Previously, he was the director of the institute from 2001 - 2008. He was also a visiting fellow in the School of Historical Studies, University of Leicester.
In the field of interfaith relations, he was a founder president and vice chair of the Christian Muslim Forum and a founder member of the Leicester Council of Faiths. His academic honours included a PhD from the University of Birmingham and an honorary doctorate from the University of Gloucestershire.[3]
Siddiqui was the author of the 2007 report, commissioned by the UK government, entitled Islam at Universities in England: Meeting the Needs and Investing in the Future.[4][5][6] He also contributed essays and articles, particularly on interfaith themes, to a number of other publications, and lectured widely.
He died of cancer in Birmingham on 8 November 2020 at the age of 66.[7]