ABOUT US
THE TRUST
The idea of the World Wars Muslim Memorial Trust was conceived in November 2015 on the initiative of Tazi Husain, a retired NHS consultant surgeon, and inspired by Dr Irfan Malik, a practicing GP. At that time, they both felt that in the centenary commemoration of World War I the contribution of the soldiers from the Indian Subcontinent, in particular Muslim soldiers, had been largely forgotten.
They were quickly joined by other like-minded persons and in a meeting in January 2016, the mission and objectives of the Trust were formulated and agreed. The Trust, which is registered with the Charity Commission for England and Wales, has as its main purpose, “to design, commission and erect stone memorials to honour the many Muslim soldiers who came out from the Indian Subcontinent to serve with British & Commonwealth forces through the two World Wars”.
Registered Charity No: 1168606
MEET OUR PATRONS
BARONESS CRAWLEY
Christine Crawley was for 15 years, Member of the European Parliament for the Birmingham East Constituency. In the European Parliament she chaired the Women’s Rights and Gender Equality Committee. In 1998 Christine was made a life peer in the House of Lords, as Baroness Crawley of Edgbaston in the West Midlands. In the Lords she has served as a Labour Government Whip in the Ministry of Defence and in the Foreign Office, among other posts.
She is a former President, now Vice President, of the Chartered Trading Standards Institute. She is also a Vice President of the War Widows Association and has made a number of visits to the National Memorial Arboretum. She was also active in the campaign, headed by Tazi Husain, to recognise the brave women of the Special Operations Executive in World War II and create a memorial to them at Tempsford in Bedfordshire. She has an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Plymouth.
BARONESS MOBARIK CBE
Baroness Mobarik is a leading Businesswoman, Life Peer (since 2014), former MEP for Scotland and Chair of CBI Scotland. In 2014, she was awarded a CBE for Services to Business and Public Service. She has operated at the highest levels of politics and industry for over 20 years, with a distinguished record of championing business interests, and a strong, personal commitment to supporting social cohesion and inclusivity.
She became a lead figure for the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party in the Better Together campaign, a cross-party group campaigning for the Union ahead of the Scottish Independence Referendum. From 2015 until 2017, she served as a party whip and then government whip for the Department for International Trade and the Department for International Development. She is Founder and Convenor of the Scotland Pakistan Network, which strengthens business, cultural and educational links between the two countries. She has also served as Chair of the Pakistan Britain Trade and Investment Forum. She is a longstanding contributor to charitable institutions, including as Patron of Edinburgh Direct Aid, Director of Glasgow The Caring City, and Founder Member and Trustee of Save The Bosnian People.
Alongside her CBE, she holds an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Edinburgh, was named Alumna of the Year by the University of Strathclyde in 2017, and was awarded a Medal for Excellence by the State of Pakistan.
LORD AHMAD OF WIMBLEDON
Lord Tariq Ahmad of Wimbledon was created a life peer in January 2011. Prior to his elevation to the House of Lords, Lord Ahmad had served for 10 years as an elected council member in the London Borough of Merton. He had a 20 year career in the City and Financial Services before joining the Government in 2012.
Following his elevation to the House of Lords, Lord Ahmad has served in a variety of ministerial roles. From June 2017, he was Minister of State in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and then a joint Minister in FCO and DFID from 2019. Since 2020 he has served as Minister of State in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. His current responsibilities include South and Central Asia, North Africa, the United Nations and the Commonwealth.
He also serves as the UK’s Minister for Human Rights and the Prime Minister’s Special Representative for Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict.
Lt Gen (Retd) James Bashall CB CBE
Lieutenant General James Bashall retired from the Regular Army in October 2018 after 34 years service. His final post was Commander Home Command, based in Aldershot, where he worked extensively with ethnic communities across the UK to promote opportunities and awareness of service in the British Army.
He began his military career in the Parachute Regiment. For twenty years, he served with the Regiment on exercise and operations around the world, and in 2002 led the initial deployment of the Regiment into Kabul, Afghanistan. He also served in Iraq in 2003, and then returned to Basra in 2007 as a brigade commander. His final operational tour was into Libya in 2011, when he led a civilian evacuation operation from Malta during the early days of the crisis. From there, he commanded 1st Armoured Division in Germany and then spent two years as Chief of Staff Operations at PJHQ. He also spent six months at Army Headquarters as Director Personnel.
Since leaving the Army in 2018, he has worked in several new fields. In particular, he is the National President of the Royal British Legion. He also runs his own consultancy company and works part time for a number of private sector companies advising boards and senior executives.
MEET OUR TRUSTEES
SIR WILLIAM BLACKBURNE
Sir William is a retired High Court Judge. On stepping down from full-time judicial duties in 2009, he became member of a small group which steered to completion the setting up of the RAF Bomber Command Memorial near Hyde Park Corner in London, unveiled by HM The Queen in 2012. Later that year, he became Chairman of the Pakistan Society, reflecting his long association with Pakistan stretching back to the early 1960s and his concern to ensure that good and positive things about that country are recognised, particularly at a time when it appears so much in a negative light in the media. He is no less concerned to ensure that the wider Muslim contribution to the life and history of the United Kingdom is known and appreciated alongside the contributions made by the many others from elsewhere in the world to contemporary Britain. Sir William is chairman of the trustees.
IMAM ASIM HAFIZ OBE
Asim graduated in 1999, and later gained an MA in Contemporary Islamic Studies at the University of London. He served as Imam/teacher in several mosques and the NHS before being appointed the first full-time Muslim Chaplain at HM Prison Wandsworth in 2003. Two years later, he was appointed the first Muslim Chaplain to the Armed Forces and his duties took him on a number of visits to Afghanistan providing religious advice to UK and US commanders. In 2009, he founded the Armed Forces Muslim Association, a support network for Muslim service personnel and, in 2014, the Armed Forces Muslim Forum aimed at improving understanding between British Muslim communities and their Armed Forces. Currently, he continues to serve as the Muslim Religious Adviser to the Armed Forces.
DR IRFAN MALIK
Irfan was born in Nottingham where he now works as a full-time GP. On researching his family history, he learnt of the unique military heritage of his ancestral village, Dulmial, in the Salt Range of the Punjab, Pakistan, which had sent more men to fight in World War War One than any other in South Asia and was rewarded by a 12-pounder Blomefield cannon transported all the way from Scotland. He discovered that many descendants of the 460 men who left the village in the War, some three thousand, now lived in Britain and this led him to set up ‘The Friends of Dulmial Society’, aimed at researching the records of these men and the journey of the cannon.
TONY McCLENAGHAN
Tony was in the British Army for 12 years and then worked in the field of risk management. Since retirement he has followed up his long interest in Indian military history with several books relating to the military forces of the Indian Princely States, the latest being an account of the contribution of the Indian Princely States to the First World War, published in 2019.
ATIF MEHMOOD
Atif works as an accountant in Nottingham. He shares with Irfan the same ancestral military heritage of Dulmial and remembers as a child playing with the World War One cannon awarded the village. His interest in the stories of these men who came out to fight in the War has grown over the years.
HASIB UR-RUB
Hasib is a Medical Practitioner and a Fellow of the Royal College of General Practitioners. He graduated from the University of Southampton in 1984. He was a GP Partner in his practice in Chislehurst for 30 years. Outside of his clinical practice he has been very involved in Medical Politics, Medical Education, General Practice Information Management and Technology with a particular interest in data quality. He is the founder, chairman and an executive director of a health care provider organisation in South East London which provides wide-ranging services, including to some of the most vulnerable members of society.
HAIDER HUSAIN
Haider is an experienced business leader with over 23 years of management, strategy, sales, delivery and operational experience within healthcare IT. He is currently Chief Operations Officer at Healthinnova, a company which provides advisory and consultancy services on how to derive the most value from digital health investments and from innovative and affordable technologies in the delivery of healthcare. He also serves on the boards of the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) and Milton Keynes University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and is a trustee of Dementia Carers Count. He is a member of the British Standards Institute (BSI) Healthcare Organisation Management committee where he chairs a panel which aims shortly to publish a standard for the validation of Artificial Intelligence for use within the health and care ecosystem.
ANWAR ZAIDI
He has worked in the financial services industry for close to 40 years. This included varying roles at international banks in Karachi, Hong Kong, Bahrain, London and New York. He retired from his role as the CEO of HBL UK.
Anwar has an MBA from IBA Karachi, an MSc (Computer Science) from UCL, London and attended the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School, Boston.
He is a Freeman of the City of London and provides voluntary service to a number of charities.
MATEEN ZAKI
Mateen has worked in Education and Recruitment at the top levels of Management. She lead initiatives for high achievement in learning in the Education Service such as the Truancy Project, Special Educational Needs, the Education Welfare Service and Resource Management for Schools.
Latterly she has advised as a consultant for businesses in Pakistan, negotiating Trade opportunities and establishing Supply Chains.
Mateen graduated from Punjab University and undertook her MBA at the University of Buckingham specialising in challenges of Management in the Public and Private sectors. She gained an additional Diploma in Marketing in the Services Industry.
Mateen is also a qualified Homeopath who takes a keen interest in Herbal Medicine. She has three children.
SHAMA HUSAIN
As the widow of the founder of this project, Shama has witnessed its entire evolution. Born and brought up in Pakistan, she has degrees from the University of Punjab and the University of Peshawar and worked as a television producer before she moved to the United Kingdom in the early 1970s. After bringing up her two children she went back to university and gained a degree in Education at Cambridge in 1992. She then worked as a primary school teacher in Cambridgeshire and Bedfordshire and after retiring began her ‘Bridges in Faith’ project giving talks on inter-faith understanding. For seventeen years she was Honorary Secretary of the Pakistan Society in London. She now keeps herself busy with writing, gardening and her grandchildren.
PROJECT ARCHITECT
BENEDICT O’LOONEY OF BENEDICT O’LOONEY ARCHITECTS
Benedict O’Looney Architects is a south London practice best known for mosques and the restoration and re-purposing of historic buildings. Their new wing for the Croydon Mosque and Peckham Mosque project, has been commended by the Brick Awards and the RICS Awards.
The practice’s work is inspired by both contemporary architecture and traditional building. The mosque projects look to the rich world of Islamic design. A deep interest in English Arts and Crafts and Victorian architecture helps connect the new projects to their, mostly urban, settings.
In addition to architecture Benedict has taught building history and drawing at the Architectural Association and New York University. His great-grandfather and grandfather both served in the Indian Army, the latter in East Africa and Mesopotamia during the Great War.
Practice website: http://www.benedictolooney.co.uk/
TRUST AMBASSADORS
Major General (retd) SYED ALI HAMID (Pakistan)
Ali was commissioned into the Pakistan Armoured Corps in 1968 and, since retiring in 2005, has continued the historical literary pursuits of his father, Maj Gen Syed Shahid Hamid, publishing the history of his cavalry regiment and of the Pakistan Armoured Corps. He is the author of over a hundred articles on a variety of topics related to the Indian Subcontinent pre and post-1857, Pakistan’s military heritage, etc. He is presently writing a book related to POWs from the Subcontinent held captive in Europe during the Second World War.
Ali has also undertaken projects in the field and has recently completed one for the British Association for Cemeteries in South Asia (BACSA), related to restoring three mass graves of the soldiers of HM 24th Foot at the battlefield of Chillianwala. One of his main areas of interest is the participation of soldiers from regions of Pakistan in the Great War and in his field research, he has located over 40 memorials which were constructed in villages in the Punjab and NWFP that sent a large number of men to fight. He is currently seeking funding for renovating/relocating these memorials. He is also a member of a committee of the CWGC that is assisting in investigating and recording names of soldiers whose deaths during the Great War were not commemorated.
Squadron Leader (retd) RANA CHHINA (India)
Since retirement from active service with the Indian Air Force in 1997, Rana has pursued his interest in military history. He is a leading historian of the Indian Air Force and the former British Indian Army and has published widely. He is currently Secretary of the Centre for Military History and Conflict Studies (Formerly Centre for Armed Forces Historical Research) in New Delhi.
IMTIAZ (TAZI) HUSAIN
TAZI HUSAIN established the Trust. He was born in South India and grew up in Pakistan where he qualified in Medicine and served as an army medical officer before coming to Britain in the late 60s to train in urological surgery. His career then took him to Abu Dhabi in 1974, where he founded the Emirates Medical Journal and brought out a textbook on Tropical Urology & Renal Disease, following which he taught in the medical school in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, before returning to NHS practice in Bedford in 1995. After retiring from full-time practice in 2009, he taught anatomy to students at Cambridge. As chairman of the Tempsford Memorial Trust, Tazi was involved in setting up a memorial to the women agents of the SOE (Special Operations Executive) in the village of Tempsford which was unveiled by HRH the Prince of Wales in 2013.
http://www.tempsfordmemorial.co.uk/
Tazi died in 2016 before his vision and original design for the World Wars Muslim Memorial could be realised.