Khan Abdul Wali Khan (11 January 1917 – 26 January 2006) was a Pakistani politician who served as president of the National Awami Party from 1967 till its dissolution in 1986, and then of the Awami National Party, a left wing Pashtun nationalist federalist party. He was the Leader of the Opposition twice, from 1972 to 1975 and from 1988 to 1990. A political rival of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, he led the Pakistan National Alliance, and then a nationwide uprising, against the Pakistan Peoples Party in the 1977 parliamentary election.
His early years were marked by his involvement in his father Abdul Ghaffar Khan's non-violent anti-colonial resistance movement, the Khudai Khidmatgar, against the British Raj. He narrowly escaped an assassination in his early years and was later sent to school at Colonel Brown Cambridge School in Dehradun.Interview with Wali Khan, Feroz Ahmed Pakistan Forum, Vol. 2, No. 9/10 (June – July 1972), pp. 11-13-18.Schofield, Victoria (22 August 2003), Afghan Frontier Feuding and Fighting in Central Asia. Tauris Parke Paperbacks; General edition. In his late teens, he became active in the Indian National Congress, with which the Khudai Khidmatgar was aligned. After the independence of Pakistan in 1947, Wali Khan initially became a controversial figure in Pakistani politics because of his association with the Congress which opposed the establishment of Pakistan.Pirzada, Sayyid A. S. (2000). The Politics of the Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Islam Pakistan, 1971–1977. Oxford University Press Inc, USA.
A respected politician in his later years, he contributed to Pakistan's 1973 constitution and led protests for the restoration of democracy in the 1960s and 1980s.Chowk, Khan Abdul Wali Khan: His Father's Shadow? January 25, 2006 . Last accessed 23 June 2006. In the 1970s, he also served as the parliamentary leader of opposition in Pakistan's first directly elected parliament.
Early life Wali Khan was born on 11 January 1917, to a Muḥammadzay Pashtun family of local landlords in the town of Utmanzai in Charsadda district of the North-West Frontier province of what was then undivided India. His father, Abdul Ghaffar Khan (Bacha Khan), was a prominent Pashtun Nationalist and founder of the pacifist Khudai Khidmatgar ("Volunteer" in Pashto) movement. His mother, Mehar Qanda Khan, belonged to the nearby Razar village, and married Bacha Khan in 1912; she died during the flu pandemic after World War I.Ghaffar Khan, (1983) Zama Zhwand au Jaddo Jehad (Pashto) Kabul
Wali Khan, the second of three sons, received his early education from the Azad Islamia School in Utmanzai. In 1922, this school became part of a chain of schools his father had formed during his social reform activities. It was from this network of schools that the Khudai Khidmatgar movement developed, eventually challenging British authority in the North-West Frontier Province (now Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) through non-violent protests and posing one of the most serious challenges to British rule in the region.
As a child he acted in a play, Dray Yatemaan (Three Orphans), the first ever Pashto stage drama, written in 1924 by Abdul Akbar Khan, an associate of his father and a pioneer of Pashto revolutionary poetry, playing an orphan alongside his brother Abdul Ghani Khan.
In May 1930, Wali Khan narrowly escaped being killed during a military operation by the British Indian Army against his home village. In 1933, he attended the famous Colonel Brown Cambridge School in Dehra Dun. He did not pursue further education because of recurring problems with his eyesight, which led to him wearing glasses for the rest of his life.
Despite his pacifist upbringing, as a young freedom fighter, Wali Khan seemed exasperated with the pacifism advocated by his father. He was to later explain his frustration to Gandhi, in a story he told Muklaika Bannerjee, "If the cook comes to slaughter this chicken's baby, is non-violence on the part of the chicken likely to save the younger life?" The story ended with a twinkle in his eye when he remembered Gandhiji's reply, "Wali, you seem to have done more research on violence than I have on non-violence."Bannerjee, Muklaika (Saturday, 4 February 2006). "Wali Baba, my adoptive father". Indian express. Retrieved 10 February 2006. His first wife died in 1949 while Wali Khan was in prison. In 1954, he married Nasim Wali Khan, the daughter of an old Khudai Khidmatgar activist.
Early politics
In 1942, Wali Khan a young man of 25 years, joined the Khudai Khidmatgar movement. Soon after, he formally stepped into politics by joining the Indian National Congress where he eventually served as a provincial joint secretary of the party. He was arrested and charged under the Frontier Crimes Regulations, in 1943, at the height of the crackdown against the Quit India Movement. He opposed the 1947 division of the India and criticised the decision.Wali Khan later explained his position, "I was amazed that the British, who had given India one government from the Khyber to Cape Comorin should break it up so quickly. It reminded me of when we were children and we used to sit on the river bank and make castles in the sand; and then in one movement we'd kick it all down."
His decision to serve in a more prominent political role was said to have been influenced by his elder brother, Ghani Khan's, decision to withdraw from politics. With his father in jail, Khan took over leading his father's supporters. Despite his father's efforts against division and a brief attempt to instead create a new nation called Pakhtunistan, on 14 August 1947, Pakistan came into being. The new nation was divided into two wings (West and East Pakistan), separated by a thousand miles (1500 km) of Indian territory.
Like his father after the creation of Pakistan, Wali Khan agitated for Pashtun autonomy within a Pakistani Federal system, which placed him at odds with government authorities. Imprisoned without charge in 1948, he was freed in 1953; he immediately started negotiations with the central government to allay apprehensions about the Khudai Khidmatgar.Amir, Intikhab (27 January 2006). "Wali Khan: A life of struggle". The Dawn. DAWN group. Retrieved 10 November 2006. He held talks with then NWFP Chief Minister Sardar Abdul Rashid and Prime Minister Muhammad Ali Bogra. He also held a series of meetings with then Governor General Ghulam Mohammed. These negotiations proved successful and led to the release of hundreds of imprisoned activists belonging to the Khudai Khidmatgar movement. Wali Khan next joined the National Awami Party (NAP) in 1956, a new political party formed by his father along with other progressive and leftist leaders from both wings of Pakistan.
The National Awami Party seemed to be on its way to victory in the 1959 elections,Ziring, Lawrence (November 2004). Pakistan in the 20th Century. A Political History. OUP Pakistan. when the civilian President Iskandar Mirza was ousted in a coup by the military, under Commander-in-Chief Ayub Khan. One of Ayub Khan's first decisions after he came to power was to outlaw political activity and imprison politicians. Abdul Wali Khan, along with many other politicians at the time, was imprisoned and disqualified from contesting elections or participating in politics as part of this purge.
Politics: 1958–1972
By 1962, Ayub Khan introduced a new constitution and announced he would run in the next Presidential election. The opposition parties united under the Combined Opposition Party alliance and fielded a joint candidate against Ayub Khan in the Presidential elections. As an opposition leader, Wali Khan supported the consensus candidate Fatima Jinnah, sister of Pakistan's founder Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Wali Khan assisted Fatima Jinnah in her election campaign and served as her election agent.
The opposition's election campaign however proved a failure and Ayub Khan was re-elected in 1964, in part due to alleged vote rigging by the central government, and also because of divisions within the opposition.Mazari, Sherbaz Khan (1999) A Journey into disillusionment. Oxford University Press. These divisions were particularly sharp between Wali Khan and National Awami Party President Maulana Bhashani, as the Pro-Mao Bhashani was alleged to have unofficially supported Ayub Khan because of the government's pro-China policy.
These divisions came to the surface in 1967, when the National Awami Party formally split into Wali Khan and Bhashani factions. Wali Khan was elected President of his own faction of the National Awami Party in June 1968."Afzal Bangash Speaks: Class Struggle, Not a Tribal War" Source: Pakistan Forum, Vol. 2, No. 9/10 (June – July 1972), pp. 14–18. Published by: Middle East Research and Information Project. In the same year, popular unrest broke out against Ayub Khan's rule in Pakistan, due to increasing corruption and inflation. Wali Khan, along with most of the opposition parties, including future Bangladeshi President Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and others, formed the Democratic Action Committee to negotiate with Ayub Khan for the restoration of democracy.Gauhar, Altaf (1996). Ayub Khan: Pakistan's First Military Ruler. Oxford University Press, USA (28 September 1996).
Attempting to provide Ayub Khan with an honourable exit from power, negotiations between Ayub Khan and the opposition continued between 9 and 10 May 1969. However, despite a compromise agreement on some issues, it was alleged that the military leadership and its political allies did not want Ayub Khan to succeed. Wali Khan held a separate meeting with Ayub Khan on 11 May to convince him to compromise. Ayub refused, and shortly afterwards Ayub resigned under pressure from the military.
The new military leader, Yahya Khan, called for general and provincial elections in 1970, promising to transfer power to the majority party. In the elections, Sheikh Mujeeb-ur Rehman, Bengali nationalist and leader of the Awami League, won a majority of seats nationally and all the seats from the East wing of the country. (See Elections in Pakistan.) In West Pakistan, the charismatic populist Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto won the second largest number of seats in the assembly, almost solely from the Punjab and Sindh provinces. Wali Khan was elected to both the provincial Assembly as a member of the Provincial Assembly and the National Assembly from his home constituency of Charsadda.
Despite the results, the military government rejected the Awami League's victory. Shocked on hearing the news that the military junta would not transfer power to the majority Bengalis, Khan was to later tell A.P. journalist Zeitlin, "I remember Bhutto said that it had been arranged with the 'powers that are' that in East Pakistan Sheikh Mujibur Rahman would rule, and in West Pakistan, Mr. Bhutto would be the Prime Minister."Badruddin, Umar. (2002) Last phase of the dialogues Weekly Holliday. Last accessed on 19/07/07
In 1971, in an attempt to avert a possible showdown between the Military and the people of East Pakistan, on 23 March 1971, Khan, along with other Pakistani politicians, jointly met Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. They offered support to Mujib in the formation of a government, but it was too late to break the impasse as Yahya Khan had already decided on a full-scale military crackdown. Pakistan's increasing vulnerability and widespread international outrage against the military crackdown eventually created a situation that led to war in East Pakistan. This war proved disastrous and culminated in Pakistan's armed forces being defeated in East Pakistan and the creation of the new state of Bangladesh. Shocked by the defeat, Yahya Khan resigned from office and the military. Under General Gul Hassan Khan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was brought back from America and appointed the Civilian Chief Marshal Law Administrator and President.