About Iqbal

Iqbal has a Arabic origin, meaning Fortunate.

Famous People:
Fullname: Iqbal Ahmed
Fame: Entrepreneur
Comment: British entrepreneur of Bangladeshi origin. Based out of Manchester, he made his fortune in shrimp. The success of his two companies, Seamark and Ibco, have turned him into one of the UK's richest men.

Fullname: Iqbal Masih
Fame: Activist
Comment: Pakistani boy who was forced into bonded labor in a carpet factory at the age of four, became an international figurehead for the Bonded Labour Liberation Front at the age of 10 and was brutally murdered in 1995 at the age of 12.

Iqbal was sold as a child slave at the age of four for the equivalent of $12 USD. He was forced to work on a carpet loom in a small town called Muridke near Lahore, and was made to work twelve hours per day. Due to long hours of hard work and insufficient food and care, Iqbal was undersized. At twelve years of age, Iqbal was the size of a six-year old boy.

At the age of 10, he escaped the brutal slavery and later joined the BLLF (Bonded Labor Liberation Front of Pakistan) to help stop child labor around the world. Iqbal helped over 3,000 Pakistani children that were in bonded labor escape to freedom, and made speeches about child labor all around the world.

He was murdered on Easter Sunday 1995 in Muridke in the middle of a busy road. Some locals were accused of the crime but it is assumed by many that he was assassinated by members of the "Carpet Mafia" because of his famous fight against the child labour industry.

In 1994, Iqbal was awarded the Reebok Human Rights Award. In 2000, he was posthumously awarded The World's Children's Prize for the Rights of the Child. In January 2009, the United States Congress established the annual Iqbal Masih Award for the Elimination of Child Labor.

Stage Names:
Stage name: Iqbal Bahu
Given name: Muhammad Iqbal Bahoo
Comment: Pakistani sufi singer born in Gurdaspur, Punjab, India, but migrated to Pakistan after Independence, and settled in Lahore. Iqbal Bahu mastered the Sufi tradition of the well-known Sufi saint Sultan Bahu. He sings many Sufi songs for Radio Pakistan and Pakistan Television and was awarded the Tamgha-i-Imtiaz honor by the Government of Pakistan in 2008.