Mohammad Daoud Khan
Mohammad Daoud Khan (Pashto: محمد داود خان), also romanized as Daud Khan[2] or Dawood Khan[3] (18 July 1909 – 28 April 1978), was an Afghan politician who served as prime minister of Afghanistan from 1953 to 1963 and, as leader of the 1973 Afghan coup d'état which overthrew the monarchy, served as the first president of Afghanistan from 1973 until his assassination in the Saur Revolution.[4]
Mohammad Daoud Khan
Mohammad Zahir Shah (as King)
- Nur Muhammad Taraki (as Chairman of the Presidium of the Revolutionary Council)
- Mohammad Najibullah (as President, 1987)
Mohammad Zahir Shah (as King)
Sardar Prof. Abdul Khaliq Khan Telai (As only Sardar surviving the Saur Revolutionist Purge)
Mohammad Zahir Shah
18 July 1909
Kabul, Emirate of Afghanistan
28 April 1978 (aged 68)
Kabul, Democratic Republic of Afghanistan
Execution
near Taj Beg hill
Princess Zamina Begum (cousin), sister of King Zahir Shah
7
Born into the Afghan royal family and addressed by the prefix "Sardar", Khan started as a provincial governor and later a military commander before being appointed as Prime Minister by his cousin, King Mohammad Zahir Shah, serving for a decade. Having failed to persuade the King to implement a one-party system, Khan bloodlessly overthrew the monarchy with the backing of Afghan Army officers, and proclaimed himself the first President of the Republic of Afghanistan, establishing an autocratic one-party system under his National Revolutionary Party.
Khan was known for his autocratic rule,[5] and for his educational and progressive[6] social reforms.[7] Under his regime, he headed a purge of communists in the government, and many of his policies also displeased religious conservatives and liberals who were in favor of restoring the multiparty system that existed under the monarchy. Social and economic reforms implemented under his ruling were successful, but his foreign policy led to tense relations with neighboring countries. In 1978, he was deposed and assassinated during the 1978 Afghan coup d'état, led by the Afghan military and the communist People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA).[8][9] His body was discovered 30 years later and was identified by a small golden Quran gifted by King Khalid of Saudi Arabia he always carried. He received a state funeral.[10][11]
Early life[edit]
Khan was born in Kabul, Emirate of Afghanistan, into a Pashtun family and was the eldest son of the diplomat Prince Mohammad Aziz Khan (1877–1933; an older half-brother of King Mohammad Nadir Shah) and his wife, Khurshid Begum. He lost his father to an assassination in Berlin in 1933, while his father was serving as the Afghan Ambassador to Germany. He and his brother Prince Naim Khan (1911–1978) then came under the tutelage of their uncle Mohammad Hashim Khan (1884–1953). Daoud proved to be an apt student of politics.
Educated in France, he served as a senior administrator in the Kingdom of Afghanistan, serving as Governor of the Eastern Province in 1934–35 and in 1938–39, and was Governor of Kandahar Province from 1935 to 1938.
In 1939, Khan was promoted to Commander of the Central Forces.[12] As commander, he led Afghan forces against the Safi during the Afghan tribal revolts of 1944–1947.[12] From 1946 to 1948, he served as Defense Minister, then Interior Minister from 1949 to 1951. In 1948, he served as Afghan Ambassador to France.
In 1951, he was promoted to General and served in that capacity as Commander of the Central Corps of the Afghan Armed Forces[13] in Kabul from 1951 to 1953.[14]
On 28 June 2008, his body and those of his family were found in two separate mass graves outside the walls of Pul-e-Charkhi prison, District 12 of Kabul city. Initial reports indicate that sixteen corpses were in one grave and twelve others were in the second.[10] On 4 December 2008, the Afghan Health Ministry announced that the body had been identified on the basis of teeth molds and a small golden Quran, a present he had received from the King of Saudi Arabia, found near the body.[47]
On 17 March 2009, General Daoud was given a state funeral.[10] His only surviving child, Dorkhanai, attended the funeral.[11]
Daoud and following family members that were killed (resembling the Murder of the Romanov family by the Bolsheviks) on the same day on 28 April 1978 are buried at an incomplete hilltop tomb located 2.5 km west of Darul Aman Palace, Kabul:[48][49]
Public image[edit]
News sources in the 1970s claimed that General Daoud Khan said he was happiest when he could "light his American cigarettes with Soviet matches."[50][31]
Mohammad Daoud Khan was retrospectively described as an "old-fashioned statesman, compassionate yet reserved and authoritarian" by The Guardian's Nushin Arbabzadeh.[24] Then-President Hamid Karzai hailed Khan's courage and patriotism in comments after his 2009 state funeral, saying he was "always thinking of the advancement and prosperity of the country."[51] Some Afghans fondly consider him to be the best leader their country has had in modern times.[52]
During his time as prime minister and president, Khan was highly unpopular among the non-Pashtun minorities in Afghanistan because of his alleged Pashtun favouritism.[53] During his regime, all significant positions in the government, army and educational institutions were held by Pashtuns. His attempt at the Pashtunisation of Afghanistan reached such an extent that the word 'Afghan' started being used to refer only to Pashtuns and not to the other minority groups who collectively formed a majority in Afghanistan.[54]
The Afghan Armed Forces were allied with Daoud Khan and supported his goal of promoting Pashtuns to higher posts in the Afghan Armed Forces. In 1963, Afghan Uzbeks were barred from becoming high-ranking officers in the Afghan armed forces. Similarly only a few Tajiks were allowed to hold the position of officer in the Afghan army, while other ethnicities were excluded from those positions.
Daoud Khan viewed the Afghan armed forces as a crucial vector in the Pashtunisation of Afghan state.[55] The Panjshir uprising in 1975 is also believed to be result of anti-Pashtun frustration which had been building up in Panjshir valley as result of Daoud Khan's policies.[56]
In September 1934, Daoud Khan married his cousin, the Princess Zamina Begum (11 January 1917 – 28 April 1978), sister of King Zahir (15 October 1914 – 23 July 2007). The couple had four sons and four daughters: