Sardar Abdul Qayyum Khan, who died in Islamabad on Friday at the ripe age of 91, was rightly called Mujahid-i-Avval (the first mujahid), because he was the first to raise the banner of revolt for Kashmir’s freedom. The venues of his endeavours ranged from battlefields to corridors of power and diplomacy in a career that spanned more than six decades. That he failed to achieve the mission of his life — making Kashmir part of Pakistan — was due to no fault of his, for factors too powerful for him to overcome stood between freedom and his people

As a soldier in the British Indian Army’s engineering corps, Qayyum saw action in the Middle East and the Western desert and put that experience to good use when Kashmir called. It was in Neela Butt that he began armed resistance to the Dogra rule, raised the first AK battalion and led it into action in an area between Uri and Poonch for 18 months till the ceasefire in February 1949.

In the liberated territory, Qayyum was to remain a political force till his terminal illness made him bed-ridden. During the Ayub era, the exigencies of local politics absorbed his energy when along with Ghulam Abbas and K.H. Khurshid, he launched a movement for the democratisation of Azad Kashmir’s politics. However, it was during the Bhutto era that elections were held on the basis of direct adult franchise. His Muslim Conference remained the main political force in the liberated territory, and he became Azad Kashmir’s president four times and prime minister once, besides being the leader of the opposition (1996-1998).

As decades rolled by, his grip on the Muslim Conference loosened. It split in 1997 between him and a faction led by Sardar Sikander Hayat, and even though unity was later restored, his image suffered. He was accused of corruption, especially when the ‘dynasty bug’ caught him, because he groomed his son, Attiq, to head the Muslim Conference to become prime minister twice.

The insurgency in the Kashmir valley in the late eighties was initially welcomed by Qayyum, because it was spontaneous and a justified reaction to the repression let loose on the valley by the Indian government. However, he was alarmed by the gradual change in the insurgency’s character because of the infiltration by non-Kashmiris. This, he thought, had damaged Kashmir’s cause.

The year 2000 marked Qayyum’s open breach with the Muttehida Jihad Council, (MJC) following the decision by the Hizbul Mujahideen to announce a unilateral ceasefire in India-held Kashmir. In an interview with the BBC, Qayyum welcomed the Hizb’s decision, hoped that it was taken after some understanding with the United States and expected India to reciprocate. The MJC denounced Qayyum’s support for the Hizb.

Qayyum stuck to his position. In an article in The Indian Express, Qayyum said (as quoted by Luv Puri in his book Across the LoC) “the worst damage to the Jammu and Kashmir cause has been caused by the jihadis. Jihad has no future. It is over” (p 117). For this statement, and a subsequent meeting with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, he came under harsh criticism from sections of politicians and the media in Azad Kashmir and Pakistan which accused him of betraying Kashmir’s cause.

Born in Poonch in 1924, Qayyum was a forceful speaker in Urdu and English, and this helped him in his cause when he went abroad to mobilise support for Kashmir’s freedom. He had no dearth of detractors, for his political opponents give credit for the Neela Butt uprising to a less-known figure, Raja Sakhi Daler Khan. He became a controversial figure when he got involved too deeply in Pakistani politics, paid the price for it and was arrested in 1977 during the PNA movement.

Published in Dawn, July 11th, 2015

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