ISLAMABAD :Pakistani spiritual personality , author, poet and educationist , Dr. Afshan Malik has been bestowed with the responsibility of spreading the message of honrable Mahmut Ustaosmanoğlu late , famous as Effendi Hazretleri.
This is the Fifth Khilafat that Dr. Afshan Malik has been blessed with. Earlier , she is leading the followers of Hazrat Ghaus ul Azam, Peer of Mohra Sharif, Ajmer Sharif and others from her Astana at Islamabad. A large number of people are seeking peace and guidance to the right path from her.
Mahmut Ustaosmanoğlu (1929 – 23 June 2022), also known as Mahmud Effendi and known to his followers as “Effendi Hazretleri”, was a Turkish Sufi Sheikh and the leader of the influential İsmailağa Jamia of the Naqshbandi-Khalidiyya centered in Çarşamba, Istanbul.
In 1952, Ustaosmanoğlu met Ahıskalı Ali Haydar Efendi (Gürbüzler), a Naqshbandi sheikh who became his murshid. Ali Haydar Efendi appointed him as the imam of the İsmailağa Mosque in 1954. By the year 1960, Ustaosmanoğlu’s life had its greatest turn after Ali Haydar Efendi’s demise and he became the leader of the path (tariqa). In 1996, he retired as the imam of the İsmailağa Musjid.
Ustaosmanoğlu tried to keep a low profile in the following years, especially after the 1997 memorandum, but his relations came under the public spotlight with a series of internal strife in the Naqshbandi order. His son-in-law Hızır Ali Muratoğlu was murdered in 1998 and in 2006, a retired imam named Bayram Ali Öztürk was murdered in the mosque and the man who stabbed him to death was lynched by the congregation.
Ustaosmanoğlu is known for having dialogues and relations with many politicians including Necmettin Erbakan, Abdullah Gül, Ahmet Davutoğlu, Muhsin Yazıcıoğlu, Recai Kutan and many more.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was known to maintain close relations with Ustaosmanoğlu. Erdoğan paid a highly publicized visit to Ustaosmanoğlu the night before the presidential election in 2014.
In 2010, Ustaosmanoğlu was given the “Outstanding Service to Islam” award and the title of “Reformer of the 15th century” at the “International Symposium on Service to Humanity” organized in Istanbul by the Marifet Association, affiliated with the İsmailağa Community, of which he is the leader.
Ustaosmanoğlu died on 23 June 2022 after two weeks of hospitalization for an infection. At his funeral, his son Ahmet Ustaosmanoğlu announced that his father was succeeded by Hasan Kılıç.
