ISLAMABAD, AUG 23 – Prime Minister Imran Khan has been named Man of the Year in The Muslim 500: The World’s 500 Most Influential Muslims.

The Muslim 500 is a book that ranks influential Muslim leaders and scholars from across the globe. This is the 11^th edition of the book.

“If The Muslim 500 was in print back in 1992 and I was then Chief Editor I would have nominated Imran Khan as our Muslim Man of the Year because of his brilliant performance in cricket, which culminated in Pakistan winning the 1992 Cricket World Cup,” wrote the editor of the book. He mentioned the establishment of the Shaukat Khanum Memorial Hospital.

The book particularly notes that when he took office in 2018, PM Khan prioritized lasting peace with India. “He wanted to normalize relations through trade, and settling the Kashmir dispute,” it said.

PM Khan ranks 16 on the list in the 2020 edition of The Muslim 500. Number one on the list is Mufti Taqi Usmani, followed by Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Khamenei of Iran and Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan of the UAE.

It listed Mufti Usmani’s source of influence as scholarly and lineage. “He is the leading scholar for the Deobandis and in Islamic finance,” according to the book and has authored 143 books in Arabic, English and Urdu.

The book also named Rashida Tlaib, a Palestinian-American congresswoman, Woman of The Year. She is the first woman of Palestinian origin and one of the first Muslim women to be elected to the American Congress as a member of the House of Representatives.