Habibullah Ghazi

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Amir Habibullāh Ghāzī (born Habibullah Kalakānī) (c. 1890 - October 13, 1929) was a king of Afghanistan in 1929. Habibullāh succeeded Inayat Ullah, who abdicated on January 17, 1929. As an ethnic Tajik, he was and is considered a usurper by the Pashtuns of Afghanistan, since he interrupted the Pashtun Barakzai Dynasty (which resumed upon his death). Among the Pashtuns, he is also recognized as "Bachaye Saqqow", which in Persian means "the son of the water-bearer". That was because his father was known to carry water. Among the Tajiks, however, he is still remembered and respected as a rightful king of Afghanistan. Additionally, he is also celebrated by the famous poet Khalilollah Khalili in his masterpiece Hero of Khorasan.

Habībullāh Ghazi became Emir for a few months in 1929 by deposing Amanullah Khan with the help of various Pashtun tribes who opposed the King's rapid modernization plans.^[1] He was himself overthrown and executed on October 17, 1929 by the army of Mohammed Nadir Khan.^[2]

1 Early years
2 Revolt
3 His Kingship
4 His exile and execution
5 References
6 External links

Habībullāh Ghazi was born in the Kalakan District of Kabul Province, north of Kabul city, in the 1890s. Ghazi's father was a gardener who sent Ghazi to a local madrasa to study the Qur'an and receive a modern education.

During his adolescence, Ghazi ventured out of his village and traveled to Kabul and later to Jalalabad and Peshawar, where he performed odd jobs to sustain himself. In the south, he ran into an old Sufi who told him that he would become king one day and then handed him an amulet to keep for good luck.^[3]

In 1919, he returned to Kabul and joined Amanullah Khan's army. Ghazi became disillusioned by his income from the army, and compounded with his disobedience and unwillingness to follow orders, he decided to return back to his village in Kalakān.

By 1928, Amanullah Khan had returned from Europe and brought with him vast social and cultural changes, including that all citizens of Afghanistan were to wear western clothes. This act, as well as pictures of the Queen of Afghanistan in western attire—without a headscarf—had upset the ultra-conservative Shinwari tribe and they called for the banishment of the King and the Queen from Afghanistan. A civil revolt broke out in Laghman, and Ghazi used his troops to quell the unrest. With a change of plans, Ghazi decided to resist the government officials in the north and, thus, a $10,000 bounty was placed on him.

With Amanullah's army engulfed in severe battle in Laghman and Jalalabad, Ghazi began to attack Kabul from the north. The revolt caught steam and by then the country was in full revolt. Kabul was surrounded by the Tribes in the south and Ghazi's fellows to the north. In the middle of the night, Amanullah handed over his kingdom to his brother Enayatullah Khan and escaped from Kabul towards Kandahar.

In January of 1929, with the King gone, Ghazi wrote a letter to King Enayatullah to either surrender or prepare to fight. Enayatullah's response was that he had never sought nor wished to be king and agreed to abdicate and proclaim Ghazi king. Ghazi married a Mohammadzai woman from the royal family that he had captured, in order to teach himself how to act as a royal King and visit the foreign representatives^{[citation needed]}.

His first order was to change the western attire back to traditional clothing and to remove all the flowers from the presidential grounds and plant vegetables instead.

By September 1929, Amanullah had stopped in Kandahar to regroup his followers and recalled his top General, Mohammad Nadir Khan, from Europe. General Nadir Khan's Army breezed through the west and southern Afghanistan. They had English weapons as well as money to pay volunteers to join the army. Furthermore, the British furnished Nadir Khan with a troop consisting of 1000 young people from tribal Wazīristan and southern parts of Afghanistan. The troop fast approached toward Kabul. The one man whom Ghazi feared was coming for him. By October 1929, Kabul was surrounded by the forces of Nadir Khan, and Ghazi escaped from Kabul towards his village in Kalakān as a fugitive.

It is said that in Jabulsaraj, Ghazi manipulated his next move. General Nadir Shah sent a message to Ghazi sealed in a Q'uran that read: "Come to the government. The government regards you and your friends, you receive general forgiveness from the Royal government of Afghanistan". The mediator between Ghazi's group and Nadir Shah was the Hazrati Shourbazari Kabul, a clergyman well-regarded by Afghanistan's citizens.

Ghazi again gathered his friends and displayed the Q'uran and Nadir Shah's letter to them and waited to hear their reply. Their answer was negative because they did not trust Nadir Shah, whom they considered to be treacherous.

When Ghazi came in front of Nadir Shah, he took the Royal position and pulled out the Royal seal from his pocket and said: "Oh God you are witness I kept and used this deposit honestly, while I was in power of Afghanistan. Now the King Nadir Shah is in my place. Oh God, you are witness, I return this deposit safe to him. I hope Nadir Khan is able to keep it safe and use it to the sack of the people of Afghanistan." Then Ghazi turned his face to Nadir Khan and said: "I do not fear for myself, but do not be cruel to my friends."

He was later taken to the execution ground. While he prepared for the execution, he knelt down and made his peace with God. Ghazi looked up toward sky and said "Oh God, I have nothing to ask from you, you have given me everything that, I have wanted, you made me King...". As he smiled the firing squad ended his life.