Muraduganduvar Ali Manikfan (born 16 March 1938, Minicoy Island, Lakshadweep), also known as Muräduganduvar Ali Befanu,<ref>Kattner, Ellen (1996). The Social Structure of Maliku (Minicoy). IIAS Newsletter 10, pp. 19–20, International Institute for Asian Studies. (Online at .)</ref> is an Indian marine researcher, ecologist, shipbuilder, and a polyglot. is his family name and is a title.
He is noted for his autodidactic research skills in the marine, ecology, and agricultural fields, not holding any formal educational qualification, and for promoting a life of simplicity.Islamic Encyclopedia (Malayalam), volume 2. Islamic Publishing House. The Government of India honored him in 2021, with the fourth highest civilian award of Padma Shri.
Life
Ali Manikfan was born to Musa Manikfan and Fatima Manika in Minicoy Island of Lakshadweep on 16 March 1938. His father Musa sent him to Kannur for formal education. As he was not interested in formal education, he left his studies and returned to his home land. According to him formal education is artificial and pointless and best way to acquire knowledge is getting wisdom by observing our environment. As a polyglot, Ali Manikfan knows a great number of languages. Besides his mother tongue Divehi (Mahl), he learned English, Hindi, Malayalam, Arabic, Latin, French, Russian, German, Sinhalese, Persian, Sanskrit, Tamil and Urdu. His other areas of interest are marine biology, marine research, geography, astronomy, social science, traditional shipbuilding, education, fisheries, agriculture and horticulture. In 1956 he worked as a teacher and then became a clerk in Minicoy. (Indian government's chief civil official on the Island). However, his interest was in marine life - in the 1960s he joined the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute of India.
New fish species discovered
While working with the marine biologist Dr. Santhappan Jones, Manikfan discovered a new fish species. Jones, impressed by Ali's observation skills and his wide knowledge about marine life, called the species Abudefduf manikfani.. Later, his knowledge was used for a paper describing the fish species in the Laccadive archipelago found in the specimen collections, on which he was listed as a co-author.
Technical and agricultural experiments
Ali Manikfan follows non-aggressive agricultural methods that take nature in consideration. For his land in Valliyur in Thirunelveli district, Tamil Nadu, he produces his own electricity from a windmill which he designed himself. He built a house there with eco friendly materials that are naturally available in the region.
Shipbuilder
In 1981 Ali Manikfan was given the responsibility of making a reconstruction of an ancient Arab trading ship, the Sohar, by Irish adventurer Tim Severin. He went to Oman to direct the team of carpenters. The ship, named after the city of Sohar in Oman, was completely hand-made, using traditional boat-building techniques, and no metal was used in its construction. It took one year to build the 27-metre-long ship, and four tons of coir were needed to sew the planks of its hull, in the same way that ancient Maldivians had built ships. Tim Severin traveled 9,600 km from Oman to China by this ship. Severin described his eight-month-long journey in a book, The Sindbad Voyage. The Sohar'' is now displayed at a Museum in Oman.
Calendar
Ali Manikfan has claimed to have designed a lunar calendar based on the new moon times published by Fred Espenak who calculated the new moon times based on Astronomical Algorithms of Jean Meeus. However the same calendar was used in Saudi Arabia from 1972 to 1999. He recommended Muslims all over the world to follow his lunar calendar.
The Islamic calendar (Hijri calendar) is a purely lunar calendar. It contains 12 months that are based on the visible new moon of every month, and because 12 synodic months is only 12 x 29.53059=354.3671 days, the Islamic calendar is consistently shorter than a tropical year, and therefore it shifts with respect to the solar calendars used in most of the Western or, more generally, Christian, world . The calendar is based on the Qur'an (Sura IX, 36-37) and its proper observance is a sacred duty for Muslims.