The 45^th Chennai Book Fair was held from 16 February to 6 March 2022 at the YMCA grounds, Nandanam. The Book Fair was organized by the Booksellers and Publishers Association of South India. Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, Chennai has been taking part in this fair for many years.

During this year’s fair, some Muslim organizations who were participating in the fair lodged a false complaint to the organizers against the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community so as to shut down its stall, following which, a 20-member organizing team came and interrogated the members of the Community. When the motive and the peaceful message of Ahmadiyyat were explained to them, they were very impressed and thus allowed the stall to continue regardless of the complaint.

This infuriated the other Muslims who then designed a banner to spread hatred against Ahmadis which read ‘Beware of Ahmadis’. However, despite all their efforts to stop people from visiting the Community’s stall, many educated people, VIPs, politicians, professors and doctors from Hindus, Muslims and Christians visited the stall. They showed keen interest in knowing more about the teachings of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community.

At the stall, documentaries and clips of the Worldwide Head of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community were also being constantly played. Upon hearing the words of His Holiness from one of his addresses at a Peace Symposium, a visitor exclaimed and said, “This is a man of God because he had foretold World War 3 years before the Russia-Ukraine conflict arose”.

People were impressed by the peaceful message of the Community and expressed their interest to know more about its ideologies, especially regarding its awareness campaigns about World War 3 and His Holiness’s message about attaining world peace.

People were also very inspired by the Ahmadi women volunteering at the stall, who asked them questions about Islam, women’s rights in Islam and the practice of hijab in Islam. These conversations acted as an eye-opener for them as their doubts were satisfactorily clarified.

Around 1500 people visited the stall. Free literature including the book World Crisis and the Pathway to Peace was distributed in addition to around 3000 leaflets. Books worth Rs. 71,000 were sold among which were copies of the Holy Quran with Tamil and English translations. About 63 members of the men’s and women’s auxiliaries of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community offered their services at the stall throughout the book fair.