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was not because dialogue is itself not beneficial. Dialogue is always good. The reason that these dialogue initiatives were not very beneficial is that I think Muslims are not very familiar with the process of dialogue. Muslims only know how to debate, not dialogue. And so, I found that while the other participants were sincerely engaged in trying to promote dialogue, the Muslims who were present were not sincere about it, because they only knew how to debate. Always, I have noticed, Muslims use the language of debate. In this regard, I would say that there is an urgent need to bring about reform in Muslim thinking. We have to convince Muslims to drop the debate method and opt for scientific, peaceful, meaningful and positive dialogue. But inspite of what is happening I am hopeful, that through such dialogue initiatives, Muslims may gain some useful and valuable experiences. Although they are not very competent to engage in dialogue, each one of them who has the good fortune of being able to participate in a dialogue will be exposed to some new learning experiences, which may help him reform himself, his thinking, his attitude to others and his behaviour. So, I am greatly in favour of interfaith dialogue, and think that it is a wonderful thing for Muslims, as well as, of course, for everyone else. What productive insights have you gained in your many years of engagement in dialogue? I must say that these dialogues resulted in no breakthrough, but personally I learnt many things through dialoguing with others. Let me cite an instance. In one of the meetings most of the participants were Hindus. Some of them spoke in a negative language. For instance, they spoke against the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. They had many complaints against him. But I explained to them, “Aurangzeb was not a representative of Islam. I’m here as a representative of Islam, not as a representative of Aurangzeb. Aurangzeb was a member of the Mughal dynasty. And Mughal rule wasn’t Islamic rule. It wasn’t even Muslim rule. It was simply the rule of a certain Muslim dynasty.” In this way, I detached Aurangzeb from Islam, and I spoke at length on Islam. This was appreciated by many people in the audience. They were very interested in what I was saying. This is the path of wisdom, the wise approach to dialoguing and relating with others. In dialogue meetings, I often find Muslims trying