Myth of Gen Yahya Khan's birthplace busted

Harda, MP, July 30 (UNI) Makdai area in this district has long been discussed about as former Pakistan dictator Yahya Khan's birthplace where he also spent his childhood but a local historian recently cited certain facts that discount the theory.

In the hoary past, Makdai was a principality of the Gond kings whose descendant Kunwar Vijay Shah is a minister in the Madhya Pradesh government.

''Without evidence, a certain historian even mentioned the childhood theory in his book 'Madhya Pradesh Ke Gondrajya', published by the Madhya Pradesh Granth Academy,'' says Dr Dharmendra Pare.

On page 116, the book names Makdai principality diwan K M Khan as General Yahya's father.

''In 1919, Makdai crown prince Drigpal Shah studied at Raipur's Rajkumar College where he was taught by Khan who was brought to Makdai and made the diwan in 1926,'' explains Dr Pare.

In 1928, Sayyed Qasim Ali authored a small volume entitled 'Makdai Mahatma' containing references to Khan's daughter Naseeman, sons Khan Ahmad Suja Pasha and Khan Ahmad Sajjad.

''Locals nurse the confusion that the general was one of Khan's sons,'' adds Dr Pare who makes an interesting revelation while referring to writer Muneer Ahmad's Urdu work 'General Mohammad Yahya Khan: Shaksiyat Wa Siyasi Kirdar' brought out by Lahore's Lakhlikaat Publishers in 1999.

Page 340 contains a reference to the general's birth at Chakwal near Peshawar on February 4, 1917.

''Gen Yahya's ancestors migrated there from Iran via Afghanistan two centuries back. His father Khan Bahadur Aga Sadat Ali, a police superintendent, had six other children Aga Mohammad Ali, daughters Haseena, Hamida, Himayat, Dafa and Akhtar. The general was the sixth child,'' explains the historian.

The dictator's primary schooling took place at Gujrat (Pakistan) and he received higher education at Lahore. After graduation, he moved to the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun. Commissioned in 1938, he became Pakistan's chief of army staff in 1966 and was dictator from 1969-71. He passed away on August 8, 1980 following paralysis.

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