72-year-old Pandit Mustafa Arif, a former journalist who worked as an editor of a government-run quarterly magazine called ‘Sadhvana Sandesh’, has spent nine years penning around 10,000 verses inspired by the Quran. His work, called ‘Labour of Love’, consists of verses in simple Hindi that uphold god’s messages of compassion and love that he hopes lead to peace in the country. Arif is a former member of Mahakaleshwar Mandir’s administrative committee in Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh. In 1992, the All India Brahman Samaj honoured Arif with the title of ‘Pandit’. To acknowledge his dedication to Hindu- Muslim unity, he was given the Mahakal Samman in 2004.