Islamic socialists drew upon the centrality of justice in Islamic juridical and political thought to make a case for the coming together of Islam and socialism. Focusing on the ideas of two important South Asian anticolonial figures, Moshir Husain Kidwai (1877-1937) and Abdul Ghaffar Khan (1890-1988), I explore the ways in which they imagined racial and socio-economic justice. The explicit interest in drawing upon the Islamic tradition led them to foreground racial equality and the role of the individual in contrast to European socialist debates. However, the question of socio-economic equality presented some challenges to their interpretation of justice in the Islamic tradition. Thinking through these challenges and their implications for socio-economic justice remains important and pertinent today.