Chief Imam and Khatib of the East London Mosque since 1993. A British Bangladeshi scholar of Islamic sciences, Classical Arabic, and Hadith — serving one of Europe's largest Muslim communities for over three decades.
Shaykh Abdul Qayum is a British Bangladeshi scholar from the Noakhali District of Bangladesh. He began his Islamic education at Sonoimuri Madrasah — completing his Dakhil in 1972 and Alim in 1974 — and his Fadhil at Noakhali Islamia Madrasah in 1976. He then studied Hadith at the Madrasah-e-Alia in Dhaka, completing the Kamil with a specialisation in Hadith in 1978, before continuing his studies in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
At the Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University, he completed a Bachelor of Arts in Arabic language and literature and a Master of Arts in applied linguistics. Among his teachers were Shaykh Bakr Abu Zayd; Shaykh al-Braq in aqeedah; Shaykh Jibreel in fiqh; and Dr Abdul Aziz Ismail in Tajweed and Qiraat; alongside Ahmed al-Kurdi in tafsir and Abdurrahman Rafat Basha in Islamic literature. He also attended many lectures of Shaykh Ibn Baz. He then became a lecturer of Arabic language and literature at the International Islamic University Malaysia.
In 1993 he became Khatib of the East London Mosque — a position he continues to hold.
Alongside his role as imam and khatib, Shaykh Abdul Qayum has lectured in Arabic language and literature, and continues to teach a circle of advanced students across the Islamic sciences — including the sciences of the Qur’an and Hadith, fiqh, usul al-fiqh, and aqeedah.
