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Khan Wali Khan

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Writers and critics

              Khan Abdul Wali Khan
   Born 11 January 1917
        Utmanzai, North-West Frontier Province
   Died 26 January 2006
        Peshawar, Pakistan

   Khan Abdul Wali Khan Pashto:(خان عبدالولي خان) (b. January 11, 1917 -
   d. January 26, 2006) was a Pashtun freedom fighter against the British
   Raj, senior politician in Pakistan and a writer.

   A controversial figure in Pakistani politics, he was referred to as
   both a hero and traitor at varying stages of his political career. A
   respected politician, he significantly contributed to Pakistan's first
   constitution, but he was also considered stubborn and inflexible by
   many of his opponents, because of his criticisms of the political
   dominance of Punjab and the Pakistani Army.

   Khan was a gifted orator and would often hold an audience spellbound
   with stories and amuse people with his Pashto proverbs. He was also a
   powerful advocate of provincial (state) rights within Pakistan's
   federal structure and despite provocations, remained an advocate of
   political change through dialogue.

Biography

Early life

   He was born on 11 January 1917, to a family of local landlords in the
   town of Utmanzai in Charsadda district of the North-West Frontier
   Province(NWFP). His father, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, was a prominent
   Pashtun Nationalist and confidante of Gandhi. He was a non-violent
   freedom fighter who founded the pacifist Khudai Khidmatgar (Servants of
   God) movement. His mother, Mehar Qanda, belonged to the nearby Razar
   village, married Bacha Khan in 1912; she died during the flu pandemic
   after World War I.

   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 through non-violent protest and
   posing one of the most serious challenges to British rule in the
   region.

   In May 1930, Khan narrowly escaped being killed at the hands of a
   British soldier during a military crackdown in his home village. In
   1933, he attended the Irish government's Deradun Public School and
   completed his Senior Cambridge. 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, Khan
   seemed exasperated with the pacificism advocated by his father and
   Gandhi. 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.” His first wife died
   in 1949 while Khan was in prison. In 1954, he married Nasim Wali Khan,
   the daughter of an old Khudai Khidmatgar activist.

Early politics

   Wali Khan with his father Bacha Khan
   Enlarge
   Wali Khan with his father Bacha Khan

   In 1942, Khan while still in his teens, 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 partition of the
   subcontinent and criticised the British decision to break up India.

   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 fathers supporters.

   Despite his father's efforts against partition and a brief attempt to
   instead create a new nation called Pakhtunistan, on August 14, 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, 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 from in 1953, he immediately started negotiations with the
   central government to allay apprehensions about the Khudai Khidmatgar.
   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. 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, 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. 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

   After a few years of martial law, 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. 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, with the formal split of
   the National Awami Party into Wali Khan and Bhashani factions(this
   split corresponded with the Sino-Russian split, with Khan taking the
   Soviet side). Wali Khan was elected President of his own faction of the
   National Awami Party in June 1968. 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.

   Attempting to provide Ayub Khan with an honourable exit from power,
   negotiations between Ayub Khan and the opposition continued between May
   9 and May 10, 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. 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 Sind
   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. In the 1970 provincial elections, his
   National Awami Party won a near majority in Baluchistan and became the
   majority party at the provincial level in two of the four provinces in
   West Pakistan as well as a handful of seats in East Pakistan.

   However, despite the results the Awami League's victory was rejected by
   the military government. Shocked upon hearing the news that the
   military junta would not transfer power to the majority Bengalis, Khan
   was to later tell A.P journalist Zeitlin (2004), "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."

   In 1971, in an attempt to avert a possible showdown between the
   Military and the people of East Pakistan, on March 23, 1971, Khan,
   along with other Pakistani politicians, jointly met Sheikh Mujibur
   Rahman. They offered support to Mujeeb in the formation of a
   government, but it was already 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
   between Pakistan and India. 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, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was brought back from America and appointed
   President.

   During this long crackdown, the National Awami Party under Wali Khan
   was one of a handful of parties that protested the military operation.
   In one case Khan helped a senior East Pakistani diplomats son in
   escaping to Afghanistan from possible internment in West Pakistan. The
   military government, in retaliation against the protests, banned the
   party and launched mass arrests of party activists (see National Awami
   Party (Wali).

Politics: 1972-1977

Tripatriate agreement

   Khan, as the opposition leader, was contacted by Zulfiqar Bhutto, who
   wanted to lift martial law and set up a new constitution. Wali Khan's
   negotiations with now civilian Martial Law Administrator President
   Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto led to the signing of an agreement with the
   government in 1972, called the Tripatriate Agreement. The agreement led
   to the lifting of martial law and removal of the ban on the National
   Awami Party. This led to the formation of National Awami Party
   coalition provincial governments in the NWFP and Balochistan. Despite
   the initial positive start, the agreement rapidly began to unravel due
   to the growing animosity between Khan and Bhutto.

Liaqat bagh massacre

   On March 23, 1973, the Federal Security Force, a paramilitary force
   under the alleged orders of Bhutto, attacked a public opposition rally
   at the Liaquat Bagh in the town of Rawalpindi and killed a dozen
   people, while wounding many more with their automatic gunfire. Wali
   Khan narrowly escaped a bullet during the attack. Public anger amongst
   ethnic Pashtuns ran high, as almost all the dead and most of the
   wounded were from the NWFP and were mostly members of the National
   Awami Party. The enraged party workers and followers wanted to parade
   the dead bodies on the streets in Peshawar and other cities of the
   province, and provoke a full scale confrontation. Wali Khan rejected
   this notion and held back his infuriated party cadres, escorting the
   dead bodies to Peshawar; he had them buried quietly and solemnly with
   their bereaved families. Wali Khan despite reservations agreed to a
   compromise with the precondition that issues of Judicial independence
   and provincial rights would be granted by the federal government after
   transition periods of five and ten years, respectively. However he
   succeeded in incorporating Hydel and gas royalties for NWFP and
   Balochistan as well as having obligated the Federal government to
   ensure equal improvements for all regions in Pakistan. Due to Bhuttos
   party's large majority in Parliament and opposition divisions, Khan was
   critically unable to stop Bhutto from concentrating greater power in
   his office.

   It was during this period that Khan supported Bhutto's move towards the
   release of prisoners of war captured by India in the 1971 war and full
   normalisation of relations through the Simla peace agreement.

Arrest and Hyderabad tribunal

   In 1974, after Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's close ally and governor of the
   North-West Frontier Province Hayat Sherpao was killed in a bomb blast,
   Bhutto convinced that Wali Khan and the National Awami Party were
   responsible, and in retaliation the federal government banned the
   National Awami Party. It also ordered the arrest and imprisonment of
   most of its senior leadership, including Wali Khan. Wali Khan and his
   colleagues were subsequently put on trial by the widely discredited
   Hyderabad tribunal.

   Refusing to participate in what he felt was a farcical trial, Wali Khan
   chose not even participate in his own legal defense. In response to one
   of the charges before the Hyderabad Tribunal, that he had been sent Rs
   20 million by Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi through a certain
   emissary, Wali Khan sarcastically filed a civil suit against the
   emissary for the recovery of the Rs 20 million. Wali Khan argued that,
   while he could not imagine why Indira Gandhi would send him such a
   large sum of money, he had never received the money, and obviously the
   emissary had embezzled the money.

Politics: 1977-1990

   After being freed in 1977, Wali Khan joined the National Democratic
   Party (NDP), which was led by Sardar Sherbaz Khan Mazari, and other
   former National Awami members. Khan refused the post of party
   President, preferring a career as an ordinary political worker. Showing
   a preference for the politics of principles, Khan and his party refused
   offers to join the Zia government as well as at least one offer to
   become the Prime Minister of an interim National government, despite
   the fact that many of his former political allies and friends in the
   Pakistan National Alliance had already accepted offers of ministry
   positions.

   Despite this, the Zia era was to mark the beginning of the end of Wali
   Khan's role in politics at the national level, due to several factors.
   Among these were declining health, a split with Baloch Nationalists Mir
   Ghous Bizenjo, his perceived support for the execution of Z.A Bhutto,
   and his opposition to the Mujahidin resistance of the Soviet invasion
   of Afghanistan. Khan opposed the Pakistan-U.S backed support for the
   conservative Mujahidin because he believed that Pakistan and the
   Mujahidin were fighting an American-backed war, and that the long term
   consequences of an interventionist policy in Afghanistan would be
   detrimental to all parties concerned.

Facts are Sacred

   Although not widely known, Khan had previously written a book in Pashto
   on his father's non-violent movement, the Khudai Khidmatgar. In 1986,
   he published another book called Facts are Sacred. This book was
   written gradually over many years and included critical and
   declassified British Imperial documents prior to the creation of
   Pakistan. Khan, citing those documents, alleged that Pakistan's
   formation was done as part of a deliberate " divide and rule" policy of
   the British and that Muhammad Ali Jinnah (Pakistan's founder), along
   with various religious leaders and feudal landlords, acted on their
   behalf.

Awami National Party

   In July 1986, Wali Khan and other former National Awami Party members
   formed the Awami National Party (ANP). Khan was elected its first
   President and Sindhi Nationalist Rasool Baksh Palijo became the first
   Secretary General of the party.

   The ANP, under Wali Khan's presidency, contested the 1988 national
   elections in alliance with former rivals the Pakistan Peoples' Party of
   Benazir Bhutto (Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's daughter). The ANP's success in
   the elections was limited to the NWFP and even then only certain
   regions of that province. In addition, Wali Khan lost his provincial
   seat to a PPP candidate, a sign of the decline in the ANP's popularity.
   The ANP subsequently formed a coalition government with PPP leader
   Aftab Sherpao as Chief Minister of NWFP and at the federal level. The
   ANP-PPP alliance collapsed in 1989 after a perceived snub by PPP Prime
   Minister Benazir Bhutto and a dispute over ministerial posts and the
   governorship of NWFP. After joining the opposition, Wali Khan started
   talks with the Army backed IJI (Islamic Democratic Alliance) and joined
   the alliance prior to the 1990 general elections.

Post retirement politics

   After his defeat in the 1990 elections at the hands of opposition
   candidate Maulana Hasan Jan (a close confidante of the Afghan Pashtun
   leader Gulbadin Hekmatyar) Wali Khan opted to retire from electoral
   politics and turned down a senate ticket from his party and the offer
   from Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif of contesting from Lahore. When asked
   his reason for retirement, he said that he had no place in politics
   “when the mullahs and ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence) decide our
   destiny and politics”.

   As Wali Khan withdrew from politics, his contact with the press and
   public became limited. This period in the 1990s would be marked by his
   party's assumption of power in alliance with former army-backed
   opponents, a focus only on provincial politics, the increasing
   influence of his wife in party affairs, corruption scandals hitting the
   once clean image of his supporters and in particular the focus on
   renaming the NWFP Pakhtunkhwa ('Land of the Pashtuns'). The exception
   was in 1998, when in response to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's
   announcement of the construction of Kalabagh Dam, Pashtun and Sindhi
   nationalists opposed construction of the dam because they believed it
   would give control of Pakistan's water resources to the majority
   Punjabis. In response to the announcement, Wali Khan led a massive
   rally against the dam in the town of Nowshera. The rally spurred other
   parties, in particular Benazir Bhutto's PPP, into leading a campaign
   against the construction of the dam. The campaign was successful and
   Sharif dropped the plan.

   In another press conference in 2001, Wali Khan supported the US attack
   on the Taliban and said that had the US not attacked Afghanistan, the
   country would have turned into an Arab colony since Osama Bin Laden had
   a well-equipped army of 16,000 people which far outnumbered the trained
   soldiers in the Afghan army.

   Wali Khan's final press conference was in 2003, when he announced his
   close friend and colleague Ajmal Khattak's return to the ANP along with
   many other colleagues, who had briefly led a splinter faction of the
   party between 2000 and 2002.

Relationships

   His relationship with PPP leader and Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfiqar
   Ali Bhutto was characterised by a fierce rivalry and a powerful clash
   of egos. He used to criticise the Prime Minister for his "fascist
   tendencies" by calling him "Adolph Bhutto" and " Raja Dahir". In
   exchange Bhutto would accuse Khan of collusion with India and
   Afghanistan in an attempt to break-up Pakistan.

   Wali Khan accused Zulfiqar Bhutto of attempting to arrange his
   assassination. During Bhutto's time in office, Khan survived four
   assassination attempts. The attempts occurred in Malakand, Dir,
   Rawalpindi and Gujranwala. He survived the first attack when the
   vehicle he was travelling in, from Jandol to Timergara in Dir, came
   under fire. One of his bodyguards was killed in the attack. He survived
   a grenade attack at the Gujranwala railway station when he, along with
   Pir Pagara and Chaudhry Zahur Elahi, was on a visit to Punjab in
   connection with a mass mobilization campaign organised by his party and
   other opposition parties under banner of the United Democratic Front
   (UDF).

   The fourth attack was carried out when he was about to address a public
   meeting in Liaquat Bagh Rawalpindi. A youth standing close to Wali Khan
   on the stage was killed by a stray bullet (Khan's supporters believed
   that the bullet was actually meant for him). Convinced that Bhutto had
   orchestrated the attacks with the collusion of Khan's old rival Abdul
   Qayyum Khan, and after one particularly narrow escape, he warned Bhutto
   on the floor of the National Assembly that he would trade bullet for
   bullet with Bhutto, after that speech Bhutto's trips to the North-West
   Frontier Province were heavily guarded.

   In one debate between the two rivals, Bhutto had just returned from a
   very successful trip abroad, and in a confrontational mood he lashed
   out at the opposition and Khan for slowing him down. When Bhutto was
   done, Wali Khan responded: "Mr. Bhutto, you stop telling lies about me
   and I will stop telling the truth about you.

   The brutality which he and his family experienced at the hands of
   Bhutto's government led to little sympathy from Wali Khan in 1979 when
   Bhutto faced execution.

Imprisonments

   Wali Khan served several stints in prison, and survived several
   assassination attempts during his 48 year political career. His first
   arrest was under the Frontier Crimes Regulations (FCR) by the British
   Raj in 1943 for his role in the Khudai Khidmatgar movement. On June 15,
   1948, he was arrested again, this time by the new Pakistani government,
   for the Khudai Khidmatgar's opposition to the creation of Pakistan, and
   placed behind bars in Haripur jail in the NWFP. In 1953, after serving
   more than five years in various jails without being charged, he was
   released by the central government. It was during this stint in prison,
   in February 1949, that his first wife Taj Bibi died in a Mardan
   hospital, along with their second son. Wali Khan was not allowed to
   attend her funeral. In February 1949, Wali Khan was moved from Haripur
   jail to Mach jail in Balochistan, then to Quetta jail in May 1951, and
   to Dera Ismail Khan jail in 1952. He was brought back to Haripur jail
   in March 1952 and then released on 14 October 1953.

   His third stint in prison was after Pakistani President Iskandar Mirza
   was ousted in a military coup by General Ayub Khan. The new military
   regime sought to purge political opponents, which led to Khan and
   hundreds of other politicians being disqualified from participating in
   politics. Wali Khan commented about his imprisonment to Ayub Khan's
   Information secretary in 1969 shortly after the Democratic Action
   Committee's conference with Ayub Khan had finished. Gauhar writes that,
   "Wali Khan narrated how Khawaja Shahabuddin asked him on three
   different occasions during the conference, 'how is it that I never met
   a bright and able person like you when I was Governor of NWFP for three
   years.' Wali Khan let it pass on the first two occasions but on the
   third occasion he could not restrain himself and rejoined, 'Because all
   those three years you kept me in prison.!'" This was followed by
   another brief arrest in 1969 after another military ruler, Yahya Khan,
   assumed power after Ayub Khan resigned.

   His final stint in prison was under Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's government.
   Khan considered this period his most difficult experience. His party
   was banned and a brutal crackdown was launched against his family and
   friends. As part of the crackdown, his brother-in-law was forced into
   exile and his son was tortured. In his book Facts are Sacred, he wrote
   of this stint in prison with some bitterness:


   Khan Wali Khan

     Much of this book was written during two spells in Jail, one under
    Field Marshal Mohammad Ayub Khan in 1969 and next during the time of
   Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1973. I was handicapped by the fact that I could
       not obtain the reference books I needed. During the second term
      especially, I regretted the time wasted. I was mostly in solitary
   confinement, and could have wholly devoted myself to writing. But under
     Bhutto, even pen and paper were often not available, leaving alone
                                   books.


   Khan Wali Khan

   This difficult experience prompted Wali Khan to be often ambivalent in
   his criticism of military dictator Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq who in 1977
   ousted Bhutto and in 1979 had him executed.

   Despite these setbacks, since his death, Khan has been eulogized for
   his principled political stance in Pakistan by a wide cross-section of
   society, including former rivals. As journalist Rahimullah Yousufzai
   wrote, "Wali Khan had many qualities. Unlike most politicians, he never
   sought power through the back door. In the truest sense of the word, he
   could neither be bought nor cowed down.

Criticisms

   Khan struggled for most of his life with the twin legacies of his
   influential father Ghaffar Khan and the perception of his
   "Anti-Pakistani activities". As a result he has been criticized for
   backing separatist ideals as well as causing social unrest in Pakistan.
   His critics blamed him for alienation of Pashtuns from the rest of
   Pakistan and for supporting "anti-Pakistani forces." He remained tagged
   with the title of traitor by the state run media and Pakistan's ruling
   establishment for much of his political career. However writers like
   Lawrence Ziring (1975) and Syed (1992) have rejected the charges
   against him, with Syed going a step further and arguing that the clash
   between the National Awami Party under Wali Khan, "was not a contest
   between the state of Pakistan and a secessionist force..but was more
   like a clash of rival political wills".

   His supporters disagree, and believe he promoted left of centre
   progressive and secular politics in Pakistan. Prior to his arrest in
   1975 he was in fact striving for a more national role more in line with
   his position as Leader of the Opposition in government and he had
   started campaigning heavily in Punjab and Sind, where he was attracting
   large crowds.

   However, in his statements he left a certain ambiguity in his policies,
   and in 1972 when a journalist questioned to where his first allegiance
   was, his reply was, "I have been a Pashtun for six thousand years, a
   Muslim for thirteen hundred years, and a Pakistani for
   twenty-five."However at the same time, prior to the 1990 general
   elections, he stated "The survival of the federation is the main issue
   in this election. Everyone considers themselves a Sindhi or Pashtun or
   Punjabi first. Nobody considers themselves a Pakistani. There has to be
   greater provincial autonomy".

   He also worked well with many politicians from Punjab including
   prominent Muslim Leaguers like Sardar Shaukat Hayat Khan and Chaudhry
   Zahoor Elahi (father of former Prime Minister Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain)
   and with Baloch politicians especially Sardar Ataullah Mengal and
   Sherbaz Mazari. He was also tagged with the accusation of being a
   communist, but was in fact a secular Pashtun nationalist. Khan's
   falling out with Baloch leader Ghous Bizenjo in the late 70's can be
   traced to his disillusionment with Communism.

   Khan, and by extension his party and family, maintained a long
   association with senior leaders in the Congress Party of India because
   of his father's close association with Mohandas Gandhi. His preference
   for dialogue over conflict with India and his links to India also
   strengthened the impression that he was anti-Pakistan amongst the more
   strident anti-India elements in Punjab. His opposition to the
   Pakistan-United States backed Afghan jihad and support for Afghan
   communist President Mohammad Najibullah damaged his standing amongst
   many conservative Pashtuns and Pakistanis.”

Legacy

   Many of his critics argue that Khan made limited contributions to
   Pakistan's polarised and corrupt political system. They challenged his
   claim that he was the major or sole spokesperson for Pashtuns,
   discounted the benefits of the 1973 constitution and the Simla
   agreement, and disagreed with his principles of not compromising with
   dictators. Others argue that if he had compromised with Pakistan's
   military establishment he may well have ended up Pakistan's Prime
   Minister but that his principles proved to be his undoing.

   Some Pashtun nationalists were also critical of Wali Khan, as many felt
   that he squandered a chance to unite all Pashtuns in NWFP, Balochistan
   and Federally Administered Tribal Areas into one big province that
   could be named Pakhtunkhwa or Pakhtunistan. Khan also faced criticism
   for his "betrayal of his language" because of his, and the National
   Awami Party, support for Urdu as the provincial language of instruction
   in NWFP and Baluchistan (declared in 1972) rather than the majority
   languages of Pashto and Balochi.

   However, in the final analysis, senior Pakistani journalist M.A Niazi
   summed Khan up best when he wrote:


   Khan Wali Khan

   Leaders of Wali Khan's calibre would challenge one of the reasons they
    trot out to justify their military interventions: the poor quality of
    civilian leadership. But in the long run, it is the nation as a whole
    that loses. We have not had so many politicians or statesmen that we
      can afford to waste such assets. If Wali Khan's potential was not
                 fulfilled, Pakistan lost more than he did.


   Khan Wali Khan

   After a long illness, Wali Khan died of a heart attack on 26 January
   2006. He is survived by his wife Nasim Wali Khan, three daughters and
   two sons. His funeral was widely attended, with condolence messages
   from Pakistani President Pervaiz Musharraf, Prime Minister Manmohan
   Singh and Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

   Asfandyar Wali Khan, his eldest son, true to the political traditions
   of Wali Khan's family, is a politician in Pakistan and the current
   President of the Awami National Party.

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