THIS is with reference to the article ‘The stormy life of Mairaj’ (B&A, Sept 1) which was a review of My Friend Mairaj — An Intimate Biography by Shamim Ahmad. Mairaj Muhammad Khan, (seen above during a Movement for Restoration of Democracy [MRD] event in 1983) and Rasheed Hasan Khan, as student leaders, had accompanied the late Zulfikar Ali Bhutto to Dhaka in the autumn of 1967.

It was there that I had arranged a meeting between them and their counterparts in East Pakistan through Nizam Ahmed.

During that meeting, both Mairaj and Rasheed had said that in the next phase of the revolution, they would eliminate even Bhutto, if required.

This was narrated to me by Nizam as I had stayed away from the meeting. Another fellow, Tariq Mehmood, was invited to the meeting, and in his memoirs Dam-i-Khayal (Sang-i-Meel, 2022), he substantiates what Nizam had reported to me.

On Dec 21, 1971, a day after the Bhutto government had been installed, Rasheed dissociated himself and the student body he was leading. Mairaj persevered, serving as minister of state, till he resigned from the post in 1972, and from the party itself in 1973.

In 2009, I asked Rasheed whether he had met Mairaj after 1971, he said: “No. In fact, Mairaj Sahib wanted Bhutto and he wanted the revolution; both were not possible.”

The trouble was that the idealism of Mairaj had a touch of nihilism about it, which explains why he was never quite comfortable in any political party.

Dr Muhammad Reza Kazimi
Karachi

Published in Dawn, October 3rd, 2024