'History'--Of Sorts

The former Pakistani nuclear scientist and illegal proliferator, Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan, has recently taken to writing rather sentimental and naïve articles for a couple of prominent English dailies in this country. While it is good, perhaps that the Dr is keeping himself occupied and busy in this way, it is also rather dangerous, this ‘writing’ business of his.

It is dangerous because (a) Dr Qadeer Khan chooses to mostly write about ‘history’, or historical events as he sees them, with very little or no proper research or objective analysis, and with some sort of sentimental, over-romanticized ‘historical agenda’ in mind, whereby he is out to prove that some ‘Muslims’ (i.e. those who appeal to his tortured and twisted psyche) were in fact ‘great heroes, or freedom fighters or some such thing and (b) Dr Qadeer Khan happens, ominously and sadly, to be a sort of ‘hero’ for many misguided and brainwashed Pakistanis, and an opinion leader/maker—and the crass drivel he is writing, is likely to be mistaken for ‘historical truth’ by large segments of our English-reading population, especially our youth in colleges and schools. That is in fact a major disservice to the entire nation.

Take a recent example, forwarded to me by a dear friend who happens to be a serious and committed historian and research scholar, with an objective and analytical/critical view of history and with a large body of research publications in Pakistan and abroad—this new ‘article’ by Dr Qadeer appeared in daily “The News”, Pakistan, on Monday, 26^th March 2012. It purports to give us some ‘information’; of a supposedly ‘historical’ sort, about a famous Frontier/border incident that occurred during British colonial rule, circa 1920s, concerning an Afridi Pashtun/Pathan by the name of Ajab Khan, and a (then) young English lady, Miss Mollie Ellis, whom this Ajab chappie daringly abducted from the military cantonment of Kohat town in North-West Pakistan (now, then British India) and carried off into the adjacent Tribal Areas.

Mollie Ellis was, luckily, released and restored to her family a few days later after this incident, which indeed caused quite a  furore back in 1923-24, and she was returned unharmed and in fact quite appreciative of the good treatment meted out to her by her abductors, Ajab Khan Afridi, and the gang which he belonged to, in fact led by his brother Shahzada Khan; and in later years, she came back s an old lady of 80 or more years, to visit Kohat and the past memories of her life. That is all well and good, and we all know and appreciate that by the code of Pukhtunwali, which rules the life and conduct of all tribal Pukhtuns/Pushtuns (‘Pathans’ to the British colonials), any mistreatment of any woman hostage, especially one expected to yield a lucrative ransom, would be unthinkable. Yet, Dr Qadeer Khan, in his article, without the benefit of any objective research or detailed study into this once-famous case, and on the basis of only ONE book which he had happened to read and on the basis of accompanying hearsay by a dozen Frontier gossips, tends to ascribe a rather different ‘motivation’ than the real one (abduction for financial gain/reward, a common Tribal Pukhtun/Pushtun habit and activity) –by Dr sahib’s lights, this Ajab Khan was actually not a common border thief and bandit, but a ‘hero’ and ‘freedom fighter’ who undertook this action as an act of ‘resistance’ against our so-called ‘colonial oppressors’, whom he refers to a number of times as the ‘wily British’! This narrow and uninformed view is totally erroneous and with no factual/historical substance at all and is only part of Dr Qadeer Khan’s own anti-West discourse at this present time, supported (and long financed) by some sections of the Pakistani establishment, that seeks to create its own parallel paradigms to justify their fanatical, extremist-Islamic views, as a counterpoise to the real anti-colonial struggle and views of the Quaid-i-Azam, Muhammad Ali Jinnah and his close lieutenants and supporters in our Freedom Movement against the British Raj. This is the point of view, or perspective, which in the first place ‘created’ the Taliban and turned a somewhat prosperous, normal and happy Pakistan into the veritable hell that it now is.

This whole farcical view, presented in Dr Qadeer Khan’s article, is based on some other, totally mistaken inferences and bits of ‘information’ that he so kindly ‘shares’ with us, and which relate to the undue promotion of several figures, of people who were involved in the effort to get Mollie Ellis back from her abductors and in these small but fallacious points, there is also a whole story, which ultimately connects with Dr Khan’s larger hypothesis and discourse. This information is hereby challenged and corrected, on the basis of firm historical evidence, from various historical primary and secondary sources, and on the basis of many years of research and analysis, as follows:

 1. The notorious 'Shahzada Gang' (Bosti Khel Afridi) seems to have been overly

romanticized in this present article, but the fact is, they were not the heroes

that they are depicted as. Even prior to the Mollie Ellis abduction from the

Kohat cantonment on 14th April 1923, this gang--led in fact by Ajab Khan's

brother Shahzada, and with Ajab himself, and Gul Akbar, Sultan Mir and Haider

Shah as its main members, were 'proclaimed offenders' with a very long criminal

record: they had previously also abducted several Hindu merchants from the area

for ransom, stolen goods and chattels from various people, including some of

their own Afridi clansmen and there were a sizable number of police FIRs lodged against

them and had also been arrested a number of times and served jail terms. In

addition, a few years prior to the famous 1923 abduction, they were also

implicated in the robbery at the house of and murder of old Colonel Foulkes and

his wife.

2. At the time of Mollie Ellis's abduction, her father was away on

out-of-station duty and the servants etc far away and asleep, hence Mrs. Ellis's (Mollie’s mother) attempts to raise a hue and cry, for which she was cold-bloodedly murdered by

Shahzada. Hardly a 'heroic' deed.

3. During the course of the investigation in the abduction, the Chief

Commissioner of the NWFP, Sir John Maffey, appointed the following officers and

others, to look into the matter and bring Miss Ellis back safe-- (a) Major

Heale, Political Agent in the Kurram Agency (b) his assistant, Khan -bahadur

Kuli Khan, APA Kurram (c) his own (Chief Commissioner's special political

assistant) Khan -bahadur Risaldar (retd) Moghal Baz Khan Afridi, who had been a

Risaldar of the Guides and was one of the most well-known and gallant native

army officers, with several famous medals and awards, from various expeditions

and campaigns, (d) Malik Zaman Khan, Afridi, who was a Khyber tribal malik, and

was sent out separately to Tirah to ensure that the abducted girl was not

allowed by the tribals there to be carried over into Afghanistan (e) a local

'Tirahwal' Malik, Subedar-Major (retd) Malik Azimullah Khan, who was appointed

to negotiate with the local mullahs to ensure Miss Ellis's release, by bringing

pressure on the Shahzada/Ajab gang to let her go without any fuss; and (f)

finally, Mrs. Lilian Starr ('Sitara'), a nurse at the Peshawar Mission Hospital,

who was in fact the widow of the former doctor incharge of this hospital, the

late Dr Vernon Starr, who had also been murdered by some Afridis, some years

earlier--she was nominated by Maffey to go along as a medical aide and possible

female companion/escort for Miss Ellis, once she was recovered.

4. The various members of this specially appointed party set about their various

tasks, and Risaldar Moghal Baz Khan and Mrs Starr set out for Tirah area on 19th

April 1923. They reached the main Khanki Bazaar on the night of 21st April, where

Kuli Khan and some of the others had already reached. Negotiations were carried

out between the chief mullah of the area, Mullah Akhundzada (under whose

protection Shahzada/Ajab and gang were hiding in that locality) and the

government party and on the night of the 22nd April, the Mullah also called and

closely cross-questioned Shahzada/Ajab and their companions, who subsequently

confessed many of their crimes and apologized to the Mullah and the government

party. According to the account given at that time, by both Khan-bahadur Kuli

Khan sahib and Risaldar Moghal Baz Khan, later confirmed in their official

statements, that Shahzada and Ajab etc had NOT acted the way they did because of

any 'notion of honor being slighted' but because sometime earlier they had

stolen some rifles from the Frontier Police and, on someone giving 'information'

, an army contingent had raided their village, and some of them had tried to

escape wearing ‘burkas’ but were caught and 'jeered at by their own womenfolk',

who said that they were 'not true Afridis to pose as women'. This had angered

them and they decided to make a truly daring plot to abduct an 'Englishwoman

from the cantonment', to 'restore their standing'. On this, even the Mullah

Akhundzada condemned them and ordered them to release the English girl. On the

same night, 22nd April, Mollie Ellis was thus handed over to the party sent out

for her, and by 10th May they were all back in Peshawar and on the 12th May, Sir

John Maffey was able to announce that the 'affair was ended'. On May 13th

(Ramadan 26th 1341 AH) a grand Jirga of the Afridi and Orakzai tribes also

openly and strongly condemned Shahzada/Ajab and their gang members and declared

their actions as 'dastardly' and assured their full cooperation to the

Government in case of any future criminal activities on their part.

These are the essential facts of the matter. It is indeed the mode, today, in

post-independence and post-colonial times, to easily dub the British colonists

as 'evil' or 'wily' etc--and of course, no one can justify colonialism-- but I

also believe that we need to look at objective facts and

also recognise (for example) some of the positive things that the British did,

such as establishing law and order on a once-lawless Frontier, and bringing

safety of life, limb and property to many people. There is no good achieved by making up insane, fictitious accounts of history to suit our own purposes. We seriously need to grow up and leave some of our childish notions and to evolve into a mature historical outlook.