The execution of an elite soldier who assassinated his boss highlights the broad support for harsh blasphemy laws in Islam
Author Archives: Tufail Ahmad
Tufail Ahmad is Director of South Asia Studies Project at the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Washington DC. His areas of interests include Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, jihadist movements and global Islamism, multiculturalism and Islamic reformation. His articles have been published in several languages, including Arabic, Urdu, Hindi, Dari, Polish, Spanish, Italian, Turkish, French, German, Chinese and Japanese. He has worked in New Delhi, London and Washington DC.
Ahmad reads, writes and speaks Hindi, Urdu and English. His research, articles & interviews have been cited by BBC News Online, BBC Urdu (Radio & Online), The New York Times, The Sydney Morning Herald, Hindustan Times, The Daily Times of Lahore, The Hindu, The Economic Times, The Australian Broadcasting Corp, The Times of India, The Frontier Post, YaleGlobal Online, Daily Outlook Afghanistan, The New Indian Express, The Statesman, Outlook magazine, Nia Zamana of Lahore, The Atlantic, Viewpoint, The News on Sunday, and by hundreds of websites, bloggers and Twitterati.
Prior to joining MEMRI, he was based at the BBC World Service in London where he was responsible for the editorial coverage of Pakistan for eight years after 9/11. In New Delhi, he worked for C-voter, Press Trust of India and Inomy.com, where he co-edited a book on The Internet Economy of India. Ahmad is a British journalist of Indian origin, and was born to peasants in the plain fields of West Champaran, where Mahatma Gandhi started his Satyagraha movement against the British rule in India.
Ahmad obtained a BA Hons in Sociology from the Aligarh Muslim University, and read Social Systems for an MA at New Delhi's Jawaharlal Nehru University and later for a second MA in War Studies at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. He also holds a PG Diploma in Journalism from the Indian Institute of Mass Communication, New Delhi. Ahmad is philosophically concerned over how Liberal-Left intellectuals are aligning with Islamist forces in their zeal to oppose America and Israel at the cost of Western values. He reads books and has no hobbies.
