Abdul Shakoor (1 January 1968 – 15 April 2023) was a Pakistani politician who served as the Minister for Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony from 2022 to 2023. He was a member of the

National Assembly of Pakistan The National Assembly of Pakistan, also referred to as ''Aiwān-ē-Zairīñ'', is the lower house of the bicameralism, bicameral Parliament of Pakistan, with the upper house being the Senate of Pakistan, Senate. As of 2023, the National Assem ...

from 2018 to 2023.

Early and personal life

Abdul Shakoor was born on 1 January 1968, in the Tajikhel village of

Lakki Marwat Lakki Marwat or Lakki (Urdu and ) is the headquarters of Lakki Marwat District in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. Lakki Marwat has become List of cities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa by population, one of the fastest growing cities in Khyber P ...

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (; ; , ; abbr. KP or KPK), formerly known as the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), is a Administrative units of Pakistan, province of Pakistan. Located in the Northern Pakistan, northwestern region of the country, Khyber ...

. Beginning his religious education at the

Madrasa Madrasa (, also , ; Arabic: مدرسة , ), sometimes Romanization of Arabic, romanized as madrasah or madrassa, is the Arabic word for any Educational institution, type of educational institution, secular or religious (of any religion), whet ...

h Dara Pizo, he later earned his

Master's A master's degree (from Latin ) is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional prac ...

Philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

from Shah Waliullah University in

Hyderabad Hyderabad is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part of Southern India. With an average altitude of , much ...

in 1991 and his Master's in

Islamic Studies Islamic studies is the academic study of Islam, which is analogous to related fields such as Jewish studies and Quranic studies. Islamic studies seeks to understand the past and the potential future of the Islamic world. In this multidiscipli ...

from

Darul Uloom Haqqania Darul Uloom Haqqania or Jamia Dar al-Ulum Haqqania (Pashto/) is an Islamic seminary ( darul uloom or madrasa) in the town of Akora Khattak, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, northwestern Pakistan. The seminary propagates the Hanafi Deobandi scho ...

in 1993. In 2002, he became a

khatib In Islam, a khatib or khateeb ( ''khaṭīb'') is a person who delivers the sermon (''khuṭbah'') (literally "narration"), during the Friday prayer and Eid prayers. The ''khateeb'' is usually the prayer leader (''imam''), but the two roles can ...

or orator at a

Jama Masjid A congregational mosque or Friday mosque (, ''masjid jāmi‘'', or simply: , ''jāmi‘''; ), or sometimes great mosque or grand mosque (, ''jāmi‘ kabir''; ), is a mosque for hosting the Friday noon prayers known as ''jumu'ah''.See: * * * * ...

located in Peshawar. He was married twice, with two daughters from his first wife and a son from the second.

Academic career

Abdul Shakoor was a teacher of different subjects such as

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the study of deductively valid inferences or logical truths. It examines how conclusions follow from premises based on the structure o ...

jurisprudence Jurisprudence, also known as theory of law or philosophy of law, is the examination in a general perspective of what law is and what it ought to be. It investigates issues such as the definition of law; legal validity; legal norms and values ...

, hadith,

commentary Commentary or commentaries may refer to: Publications * ''Commentary'' (magazine), a U.S. public affairs journal, founded in 1945 and formerly published by the American Jewish Committee * Caesar's Commentaries (disambiguation), a number of works ...

, and fatwa at Peshawar's Darul Uloom e Sirajul Islam for some 20 years.

Political career

Abdul Shakoor was elected as the

Tehsil A tehsil (, also known as tahsil, taluk, or taluka () is a local unit of administrative division in India and Pakistan. It is a subdistrict of the area within a Zila (country subdivision), district including the designated populated place that ser ...

President of

Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Pakistan also known the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam or simply as Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (F) (; ; JUI (F)) is an Islamic fundamentalist political party in Pakistan. Established as the ''Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam'' in 1945, it is th ...

students from Bannu and Lakki Marwat while in the fourth grade and later became JUI-F's ‘Ameer’ for tribal areas and special advisor to Fazal-ur-Rehman. He was elected to the

as a candidate of

Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal The Muttahida Majlis–e–Amal (MMA; Urdu: , ) is a political alliance consisting of conservative, Islamist, Religion in Pakistan, religious, and right-wing parties of Pakistan. Naeem Siddiqui (the founder of Tehreek e Islami) proposed such a ...

(MMA) from constituency NA-51 (Tribal Area-XII) in the

2018 Pakistani general election General elections were held in Pakistan on 25 July 2018 to elect the members of the 15th National Assembly and the four Provincial Assemblies. The three major parties were Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), led by Imran Khan, the Pakistan Muslim ...

. He received 21,896 votes and defeated Qaiser Jamal.

Death

Abdul Shakoor died in a traffic accident in

Islamabad Islamabad (; , ; ) is the capital city of Pakistan. It is the country's tenth-most populous city with a population of over 1.1 million and is federally administered by the Pakistani government as part of the Islamabad Capital Territory. Bu ...

on 15 April 2023. According to police, Abdul Shakoor was driving when another vehicle smashed into the driver's side of his vehicle. He was rushed to Polyclinic Hospital where he died due to severe internal bleeding. The five people in the other vehicle were arrested.

Awards and honours

Hilal-i-Imtiaz The ''Hilal-e-Imtiaz'' (; ), also spelled as ''Hilal-i-Imtiaz,'' is the second-highest (in the order of "Imtiaz") civilian award and honour given to both civilians and military officers of the Pakistan Armed Forces by the Government of Pakist ...

(2023; posthumously)

References

External links

* Pashtun politicians Deobandis 1968 births 2023 deaths Darul Uloom Haqqania alumni Road incident deaths in Pakistan Pakistani MNAs 2018–2023 Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal MNAs People from Lakki Marwat District {{Pakistan-MNA-stub