Harris Khalique was born in Karachi, Pakistan to artistic parents: Khalique’s father was a filmmaker and his mother a writer and teacher. Khalique attended schools in Karachi and earned his MA from the London School of Economics. He lived and worked in Europe before returning to Islamabad in 2001. Khalique has published collections of poetry in English and Urdu, most recently Melay Mein (in Urdu, 2012), which won the UBL Literary Excellence Award, and Between You and Your Love (in English, 2004, revised and expanded in 2012).
Khalique has participated in labor, women, and minority rights movements and has published papers and spoken at conferences on South Asian history and culture, politics, and issues around human rights and international development. For eight years he has written a weekly column in The News International. He is currently a consultant for the Development Alternative Inc. and a Team Leader for AAWAZ—Voice and Accountability Programme, an initiative that focuses on women’s rights and the rights of excluded groups in Pakistan.