BOOK LAUNCH: ISLAMIC LAW ON TRIALCONTESTING COLONIAL POWER IN BRITISH INDIA

Organised by
Islamic Courses
with the support of
Ebrahim College
:
BOOK LAUNCH DISCUSSION:
ISLAMIC LAW ON TRIAL CONTESTING COLONIAL POWER IN BRITISH INDIA
With author
*
Dr. Sohaira Siddiqui
[
Professor of Islamic Studies and Theology at Georgetown University in Qatar and
Director of Al-Mujadilah: Center and Mosque
]
Host Chair and Respondent: *
Dr. Mohammed Sinan Siyech
[
Wolverhampton University
]
Date and time
: Friday 6th November 2026, 6.30p
m - 8
pm
Venue
:
Ebrahim College, 399-401 High Street, Stratford, London E15 4QZ
Prior to the East India Company’s establishment in India in 1661, Islamic law was widely applied by the Mughal Empire. But as the Company’s power grew, it established a court system intended to limit Islamic law. Following the Great Rebellion of 1857, the decentralized Islamic legal system was replaced with a new standardized system. Islamic Law on Trial interrogates the project of juridical colonization and demonstrates that alongside—and despite—the violent displacement of Muslim legal sovereignty, Muslims were able to engage with and even champion Islamic law from inside the colonial judiciary. The outcome of their work was a paradoxical legal terrain that appeared legitimate to both Muslim practitioners and English colonizers. Sohaira Siddiqui challenges long-standing assumptions about Islamic law under British rule, the ways in which colonial power displaced preexisting traditions, and how local Muslim elites navigated the new institutions imposed upon them.
Reviews include:
“A superbly researched history of law and ideas. It covers the entirety of the British colonial presence and rule in South Asia and shows how Muslim scholars, lawyers, and intellectuals adjusted to the reality of becoming subjects of a non-Muslim sovereign.”
— Asian Affairs
“Brings a rich breadth of empirical material from South Asia into ongoing critical discussions of the impact of colonialism on Islamic law, the importance of Muslim interlocutors in the remaking of Islam and law during periods of Western colonial rule, and the enduring legacies of this struggle in contemporary Muslim politics and life.”— Law and History Review
“Of all the studies of Anglo-Muhammadan law, this is the most innovative and illuminating. In shifting the scholarly gaze from how colonial authorities fashioned this law to how Muslim legal practitioners of varied backgrounds engaged with it, Sohaira Siddiqui transforms our understanding of Islamic legal thought and practice under colonial rule.”—Muhammad Qasim Zaman, author of
Islam in Pakistan: A History
"This is the best book on Islamic law in South Asia in Western scholarship. Combining exceptionally sophisticated readings of Muslim scholarly texts with rigorous yet ingenious theorization of colonial power, Siddiqui fundamentally reorients our conception of the modern career of the Islamic legal tradition, in South Asia and beyond. A book of monumental significance that is as lyrically written as it is brilliant."—SherAli Tareen, author of
Perilous Intimacies: Debating Hindu-Muslim Friendship after Empire
"Siddiqui offers the first in-depth study of the crucial role that Indian Muslim lawyers, judges, and jurists played in shaping the colonial administration of Islamic law. Through penetrating analysis across multiple languages and genres, she shows how these figures interwove colonial and Islamic epistemologies in ways that remain deeply relevant today."—Julia Stephens, author of
Governing Islam: Law, Empire, and Secularism in Modern South Asia
Copies of the book will be available for purchase and book signing by
Dr. Sohaira Siddiqui
.
Otherwise one can purchase the book online here: https://www.ucpress.edu/books/islamic-law-on-trial/paper#about-author
About the speaker:
*
Dr. Sohaira Siddiqui
[
Professor of Islamic Studies and Theology at Georgetown University in Qatar and
Director of Al-Mujadilah: Center and Mosque
] is a scholar, strategist, and institutional leader working at the intersection of knowledge, community, and transformation. For over two decades, she has built and strengthened educational and religious institutions that reimagine how Muslims learn, lead, and engage with the world. She was recently named to the list of 500 Most Influential Muslims in 2026. As the founding Executive Director of Al-Mujadilah: Center and Mosque for Women, an initiative of Her Highness Sheikha Moza bint Nasser, Dr. Siddiqui has led the Center from concept to global recognition. Under her direction, Al-Mujadilah has launched more than 250 programs, established a global research network of over 100 Muslim female scholars and practitioners, and built local and international partnerships that advance accessible scholarship, capacity building and social transformation. Through her leadership, Al-Mujadilah has become a pioneering institution shaping contemporary conversations on Muslim women’s religious education, authority, and participation. In parallel, Dr. Siddiqui is a Professor of Islamic Studies and Theology at Georgetown University in Qatar, where she researches and teaches on Islamic law, political thought, and their intersections with gender and modernity. She is the author of three books: Islamic Law on Trial (2025), Locating the Sharia (2009), and Law and Politics Under the Abbasids (2009). She is currently editing The Cambridge Companion to Islamic Law and writing her fifth book on the development of legal guardianship in Islam and her sixth book on the mosque as an institution of transformation. Dr. Siddiqui has also written over three dozen academic and public pieces of scholarship, advancing nuanced understandings of Islamic law, colonialism, and Muslim societies. Beyond Al-Mujadilah and academia, she plays a leading role in institutional development and governance, serving on numerous boards and advising Muslim organizations globally. Her work is driven by a vision to build institutions that embody intellectual excellence, ethical leadership, and transform the communities they serve.
Host Chair and Respondent: *
Dr. Mohammed Sinan Siyech
[
Wolverhampton University
] holds a PhD from the University of Edinburgh where he wrote on Islam and Politics in India and is currently a Lecturer at the University of Wolverhampton. He has previously taught politics at King’s College London, SOAS and the University of Edinburgh, and has worked with think tanks including the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (London), the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (Singapore), and the Observer Research Foundation (India). He is also a Senior Researcher at Equi, a think tank based in London where he oversees research on social and political issues pertaining to British Muslims. For over a decade, he has written and spoken widely on politics, religion and security across Europe, South Asia and the Middle East. Some of his works have been presented at various branches of the UN, Interpol, Meta and Oxford University apart from different government departments. Sinan has lived in and travelled across different parts of the world and draws from his extensive experience working as an academic as well as a social worker in different contexts.
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