Rahimuddin Khan

Rahimuddin Khan born 21 July 1926, is a retired general of the Pakistan Army who was the fourth Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee, the Supreme Commandant of the Pakistan Armed Forces, from 1984 to 1987. He was also the Martial Law Administrator and longest-serving Governor of Balochistan, the largest province of Pakistan, from 1978 to when he resigned in 1984. He later served as Governor of Sindh with emergency powers in 1988, from which he too resigned. Rahimuddin Khan ended the bloody military operation in Balochistan in 1978 and instigated unprecedented development, which saw the province return to stability. He controversially suppressed incoming Mujahideen during the Soviet war in Afghanistan, and oversaw the construction of nuclear test sites in Chaghai. His administration is both credited for his personal integrity as well as criticized for authoritarianism. Rahimuddin Khan was born in Kaimganj, near Farrukhabad, Uttar Pradesh, India. His ancestral roots are traced back to the Pashtun Afridi tribes of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (in present-day Pakistan), from where his ancestors immigrated to Rohilkhand, northern India, during the 18th century. Rahimuddin shared close ties with his uncles, Dr. Zakir Hussain, the 3rd President of India, and Zakir Hussain’s brother Mahmud Hussain. Rahimuddin Khan was principally educated at Zakir Hussain’s Jamia Millia Islamia University in Delhi before enrolling in the Indian Military Academy. Upon the partition of India in 1947, Rahimuddin opted for the new state of Pakistan. He enrolled in the Pakistan Army as Gentleman Cadet 1 (GC – 1), the premier commissioned officer of the Pakistan Military Academy. He graduated as lieutenant on 20 October 1950, and was stationed at 1 Balloch Division from 1952 to 1954 before becoming a major in 1957. Selective martial law was declared over Lahore in 1953, in response to civil unrest following anti-Lahore Ahmadiyya Movement riots. Captain Rahimuddin Khan was part of the military deployment heading the army takeover of Lahore, which culminated in the arrest of Abul Ala Maududi. Among Pakistan's military representatives in CENTO, he attended Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, graduating from its Command and General Staff College. He was hospitalized months before the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965 with a broken ankle. He then graduated from Command and Staff College in Quetta, and was posted to School of Infantry Tactical from 1966 to 1968. When General Yahya Khan assumed the presidency and imposed martial law in March 1969, Rahimuddin Khan was appointed sub-martial law administrator to Hyderabad. He was promoted to brigadier in 1970. In February 1971, Yahya Khan appointed Brigadier General Rahimuddin Khan to preside over the military tribunal of Bengali leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in Faisalabad. Mujib, who would later become the leader of Bangladesh, had been arrested by West Pakistan troops under Operation Searchlight for charges of sparking civil disorder in what was then East Pakistan, and was to be tried for sedition. A career army officer, Rahimuddin Khan was reportedly visibly uncomfortable conducting the court trial. In mid-proceedings, he left without verification to command his charge of Rawalpindi's III Brigade upon the outbreak of the Indo-Pakistani war of 1971. However, he was forcibly recalled by General Headquarters to award the trial verdict. Rahimuddin Khan's GOC, Major General Iftikhar Janjua, instead ordered his commander artillery Brigadier Naseerullah Babar to take over 111 Brigade and lead the attack. Following appeals from several officials in the United States Senate and House of Representatives, the Richard Nixon administration dissuaded Yahya from executing Rahimuddin's unconfirmed sentence. Yahya's successor as President, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, in his efforts to recognize the new state of Bangladesh, decided to rescind the verdict. Mujib was freed from Pakistani imprisonment in February 1972. Rahimuddin was meanwhile appointed to the post of Chief Instructor at the Armed Forces War College at the then National Defence College, Rawalpindi, where he stayed from April 1972 to January 1975. Upon being promoted to Lieutenant General later in 1976, he was offered to spearhead the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission by the now-Prime Minister Bhutto. Bhutto sought Rahimuddin as a capable administrator of Pakistan's budding nuclear program, but was declined. Rahimuddin was promoted to Corps Commander of the heavy armoured II Corps stationed in Multan. After widespread civil disorder, Chief of Army Staff General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq overthrew the government of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in a bloodless coup on July 5, 1977, and imposed martial law. The Bhutto administration's military operation in Balochistan, initiated against anti-state insurgents in 1973, had claimed thousands of lives. Lieutenant-General Rahimuddin Khan was appointed Martial Law Administrator of Balochistan, which he accepted only on the condition that he be allowed to retain the command of II Corps. Following the end of Fazal Ilahi Chaudhry's tenure as President on September 16, 1978, the provincial governorship of the province was simultaneously vacated by Khuda Bakhsh Marri, and assumed by Rahimuddin. A provincial military administration was thus established for the first time in the region, and given broad powers under Rahimuddin Khan. Having inherited a Balochistan in the throes of civil war, Rahimuddin's immediate steps were to implement a general amnesty for belligerents willing to give up arms. He oversaw military withdrawal thereafter. Rahimuddin then pointedly isolated the more prominent feudal figures of Balochistan from interfering in provincial affairs. Defusing their influence, coupled with authoritarian government, caused the Baloch separatist movement to grind to a virtual standstill. Prominent tribal sardars Ataullah Mengal and Khair Bakhsh Marri left the province for foreign countries, whereas Akbar Bugti aborted his separatist activities. No effective protests, civil disobedience or anti-government movements took place throughout Rahimuddin's rule. Governor Rahimuddin's tenure also ushered in sustained development. Following the Soviet invasion of neighboring Afghanistan in 1979, Rahimuddin used the resultant foreign attention on Balochistan by introducing an externally financed development programme for the area. Forty million dollars (USD) were committed to the programme by the end of 1987, by which time Rahimuddin had resigned. He expedited the regulation of Pakistan Petroleum Limited, the exploration company charged with the Sui gas field. He consolidated the then-contentious integration of Gwadar into Balochistan, which had earlier been notified as a district in 1977. Addressing the province's literacy rate, the lowest in the country for both males and females, he administered the freeing up of resources towards education, created girls' incentive programs, and had several girls' schools built in the Dera Bugti District. As part of his infrastructure schemes, he also forced his way in extending electricity to vast areas with subsoil water. With the Soviet war in Afghanistan, the Zia government began militarily and financially aiding the anti-communist Afghan mujahideen. Millions of Afghan refugees, believed to be the largest refugee population in the world, crossed over the porous border largely through to Balochistan and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Whereas in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa under the pro-guerrilla governor General Fazle Haq, heroin freely entered with the mujahideen, to pay for sophisticated weaponry under General Rahimuddin tightly controlled barbed wire military camps were established to prevent movement of the refugees within Balochistan throughout the duration of the nine-year war. In retrospect, this prevented drugs and weaponry from infiltrating the province, despite becoming widespread in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. In March 1981, the Al-Zulfikar terrorist organization hijacked a Pakistan International Airlines airplane from Karachi to Kabul. Formed by Murtaza Bhutto, Al-Zulfikar was created to overthrow the military dictatorship that had ousted Bhutto's father, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. The hijackers threatened to murder a hostage a day if state authorities did not accept their demands, which most importantly consisted of the release of political prisoners. Upon the state's refusal, Al-Zulfikar shot dead passenger Captain Tariq Rahim, a man Murtaza Bhutto mistakenly believed to be the son of General Rahimuddin Khan. The decision to kill Rahim was taken after consultations between Murtaza and KHAD chief Mohammad Najibullah in view of this assumed relationship. Ironically, Tariq Rahim, who bore no relation to Rahimuddin, had been a former aide-de-camp to the executed elder Bhutto. Despite Rahimuddin's stand against any concessions, General Zia released the political prisoners and famously commented on the situation, "We have thrown out the bad eggs and saved innocent lives". Rahimuddin abruptly resigned from the governorship amid differences with then-Finance Minister Ghulam Ishaq Khan over resource allocation for the province. Having previously refused to head the state's intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence, he was ultimately promoted to the rank of full General in March 1984, before being appointed the fourth Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee. He hence became the first alumnus of the Baloch Regiment to reach premier rank, later followed by current Chairman Tariq Majid in 2008. Following Pakistan's return to civilian government after the lifting of martial law in 1985, the newly-appointed Prime Minister Muhammad Khan Junejo significantly reduced the powers of Governor, reducing its status as an independent administrative body to an orthodox government post under the head of state. Even as chairman, however, Rahimuddin oversaw the construction of thirty-two airfields in the province. He retired upon completion of his three-year term in March 1987. After the Ojhri Camp disaster, General Zia dismissed the Junejo government by invoking the Constitution's Eighth Amendment. Rahimuddin was persuaded out of retirement to become Governor of Sindh. However, he refused to head a caretaker government similar to the ones established in other provinces. The government accordingly took exception to Sindh, where it imposed governor's rule under Rahimuddin, citing a collapse of administration. In a controversial move, Rahimuddin summarily dismissed Z.A. Nizami from the post of Director-General of the powerful Karachi Development Authority, which he began regulating. He banned illegal housing development on public spaces. He also immediately began pushing through legislature for administrative reform during his short reign. He moved to create separate police forces for the city and the rural areas, but this was eventually resisted after his resignation by those fearing greater complications in the Sindhi-Muhajir relationship. Efforts were also made to train special riot control officers to cope with ethnic riots or massive student challenges. To combat crime, special river and forest police were set up to battle dacoity on both fronts. After a C-130 Hercules airplane carrying several senior generals, including Zia and Akhtar, Rahimuddin's successor as Chairman, fatally exploded in mid-air over Bahawalpur on August 17, Chairman of the Senate Ghulam Ishaq Khan became acting President. One of Ishaq's first decisions as President was to move for the re-introduction of the post of Chief Minister of Sindh. This was to relegate the Governorship to largely ceremonial duties. Shortly after Chief Minister Akhtar Ali Ghulam Qazi was sworn in on August 31, Rahimuddin abruptly resigned following this attempt to limit his vast gubernatorial powers. He thus retired from all government service. Rahimuddin's governorships were easily the periods of greatest power for both offices. Despite deepening animosity against the Armed Forces, there is a consensus in Balochistan that much of the development seen today was undertaken during Rahimuddin's regime. He also maintained a unique reputation for integrity during the corruption allegations-ridden Zia and Ghulam Ishaq regimes, With his government, the province's tribal sardars were taken out of the pale of politics for the first time., a time which nationalist Khair Bakhsh Marri since admitted "was the low ebb of our freedom movement". Rahimuddin Khan's tenure saw development unsurpassed by subsequent provincial governments, focusing on infrastructure and education. His electricity expansion converted vast areas with sub-soil water into green orchards that can be seen today to stretch from Quetta to Loralai. However, while he greatly regulated Pakistan Petroleum Limited in its commercial exploitation of the Sui gas field in 1982, his maneuvers for an increased share in gas revenue for Balochistan were overturned by the central government in 1985, after he had left office. Rahimuddin often broke with government policy, most notably by suppressing the Mujahideen's movement into Balochistan from Afghanistan during the latter's Soviet occupation. Contrastingly supported by the government in the North-West region, the Mujahideen brought with them hard narcotics and advanced weaponry, and became the forerunners of the Taliban movement against which the Pakistan Army would launch a full-scale war in October 2009. As a result of Rahimuddin's containment, Balochistan remained relatively free of Taliban presence until recently when the US war in Afghanistan triggered a fresh influx of refugees from 2001 onwards. However, Rahimuddin was involved in the Zia regime's acceleration of the nuclear programme, overseeing the construction of nuclear test sites in Chaghai. A few weeks after India conducted its second nuclear test (Operation Shakti) on 28 May 1998, Pakistan under Nawaz Sharif would detonate five nuclear devices via the same base