[5] In 2024, Riaz was tasked by the Bangladesh interim government to head a commission on constitutional reform after the end of the then prime minister Sheikh Hasina's 'authoritarian' regime.

[6][2] Riaz was born in Dhaka, East Pakistan (today Bangladesh) to Mohabbat Ali, a senior public servant and Bilkis Ara.

The findings that the war in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989, US foreign policy towards the Middle East, and the fifty year regional rivalry between India and Pakistan facilitated this transformation as much as domestic power jockeying made other analysts take pause before presenting simplistic interpretations such as poverty or Muslim exceptionalism as the causes.

In post-2001 Riaz challenged the dominant, at times alarmist, literature produced by policy analysts that madrasas (Islamic seminaries) in Muslim societies are "the schools of jihad" and "the breeding grounds of terrorists."

The book explores the history of these institutions, their role in contemporary society and politics, and relationships with local militancy and transnational terrorism in three countries namely Pakistan, India and Bangladesh.

Underscoring the need for reform, this study also maps the way forward for rendering these institutions relevant to future generations and suggests what policy makers of the United States and other countries can do.

On 20 November 2013, Riaz testified before the House Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific on the political turmoil surrounding the Bangladeshi elections scheduled for January 2014.

[20] The book is dedicated to Mushtaq Ahmed, died in custody after being detained for criticizing the government, and covers the Awami League rule starting in 2009.