Khilafat Centenary Souvenir 1908-2008 — Page 138
Khilafat Centenary Missionary in charge in East Africa. The East African Times published an article on Hadhrat Shaikh Sahib. It has been summarized below: "In November 1934 Shaikh Mubarak Ahmad arrived in Nairobi. In his typical Punjabi dress and green turban he attracted attention as he moved about in the town. The non-Ahmadis had called out from India one of their Maulvis (religious scholars), Lal Hussain Akhtar by name , who contended that the Ahmadiyya interpretation of some doctrinal points of Islam was not correct. A debate was arranged between him and the Shaikh in the open ground, which is now occupied by Sir Ali Muslim Club. People attended it in swarming numbers. As the Shaikh and the Maulvi exchanged their arguments in turns, enthusiasm ran high among the audience. Somebody from the maulvi's party hit the Shaikh with an orange striking him on the face while he was driving home. But the Shaikh had made his mark as a speaker and a theologian. . . " In Tabora an African Ahmadiyya Community formed and flourished under his care and, besides starting a school for their children's education, he installed a printing press and built a mosque in the town. Stones for the new mosque were all hewn by African Ahmadi volunteers and it was a sight to see them every morning carrying the stones on their heads and marching in a long line to the site of the building for months on end. It is in Tabora that he mastered the Swahili language and started translating Ahmadiyya literature into it. The first book which he published in Swahili was Safina ya Nuhu, a translation of one of the enlightening and soul stirring books , Kisht- e-Nuh, written by the Promised Messiah, the Hol y Founder of the Ahmadiyya Movement in Islam, peace be on him. The translation captured a good deal of the force and beauty of the original text and won a warm applause from the Africans for its sublime effect. Then he undertook the gigantic task of translating the Holy Qur'an which took him nearly 17 years to complete. It was published by the Standard Press, Nairobi in 1953. Maulana Muhammad Munawar, and Shaikh Kaluta Amri Abedi had both assisted in revising the translation of the Holy Qur'an. The event was unique in that never before had a Muslim rendered the Hol y Qur'an into an African language (Canon Dale, a European had produced a Swahili translation but it was more of a critical work than an unbiased and true translation). Africans considered it a great contribution to the Swahili literature and highly appreciated it. The translation is in great demand not only in Kenya, Ugan da and Tanganyika but also in Congo and Rhodesia. USA Maulana Shaikh Mubarak Ahmad took over as Amir and Missionary-in-Charge on November 26, 1983. The foremost task assigned to him by Khalifatul Masih IV Hadhrat Mirza Tahir rta was to launch a sche me to establish major Ahmadiyya Centers in the five important cities of Washington DC , New York, Detroit, Chicago and Los Angeles. The most celebrated highlights of Shaikh Sahib's tenure were the visits of our beloved Hadhrat Khalifatul Masih IVr ta to USA. He first visited in 1987. Huzur rta again graced this land on the occasion of the Centennial Celebrations of the Ahmadiyya Jama 'at in 1989 and, later, on the occasion of the