Name: Syed Adnan Ahmad

Roll No : 29th

Semester:3rd

Session : Morning

Submitted To:Dr. Muhammad Iqbal Saib

Subject : Govt.and Politics In Pakistan.

 Sahibzada Iskander Ali Mirza

Date of Birth:
13 November 1899

Date Of Death:
13 November 1969

Biography :
He was a Pakistani general and civil servant who was the first President of Pakistan. He
was elected in this capacity in 1956 until being dismissed by his appointed army commander General
Ayub Khan in 1958.

Mirza was educated at the University of Bombay before attending the military college in Sandhurst in the
United Kingdom. After a brief military service in the British Indian Army, he joined the Indian Political
Service and spent the majority of his career as a political agent in the Western region of the British India
until elevated as joint secretary at the Ministry of Defence in 1946. After the independence of Pakistan as
result of the Partition of India, Mirza was appointed as first Defence Secretary by Prime Minister Liaquat
Ali Khan, only to oversee the military efforts in first war with India in 1947, followed by failed
secessionism in Balochistan in 1948. In 1954, he was appointed as Governor of his home province of East
Bengal by Prime Minister Mohammad Ali of Bogra to control the law and order sparked as a result of the
popular language movement in 1952, but later elevated as Interior Minister in Bogra administration in
1955.
Ancestral Roots and Family Background:
Iskander Ali Mirza was born in Murshidabad, Bengal in
India on 13 November 1899, into an elite and wealthy aristocrat family who were titled as Nawab of
Bengal and later after 1880 Nawab of Murshidabad. Mirza was the eldest child of Sahibzada Sayyid
Muhammad Fateh Ali Mirza (b. 1864–d. 1949) and his first wife, Dilshad Begum née Tyabji (b. 1869–d.
1924).

The title, Mirza (lit. Master), is an honorific surname bestowed to his family to represent royalty, which
was customary to give to individuals in medieval India.[citation needed] From his grandfather's ancestral
roots, he was of Iraqi Arab descent.

The Mirza family was an influential and wealthy feudal family in Bengal, with close ties with British
monarchy. His father, Fateh Ali Mirza belonged to the ruling house of Murshidabad, grandson of the first
Nawab Mansur Ali Khan.

Education and military service in India (1920–47):

Iskander Mirza as 2nd-Lt in the
British Indian Army, ca.1920.Mirza grew up and completed his schooling in Bombay, attending the
Elphinstone College of the University of Bombay, but left the university to attend the Royal Military
College in Sandhurst when he was selected by the British Governor-General for the King's
Commission.:20–21, Mirza was the first Indian graduate of the military college, and gained his
commission in the British Indian Army as 2nd Lt. on 16 July 1920.As was customary for newly
commissioned British Indian Army officers, he was initially attached for a year to the second battalion of
the Cameronians (Scottish Rifles).On 16 July 1921, he was promoted to lieutenant and was assigned to
command a platoon on 30 December 1921.

His military career was spent in the Military Police. In spite of hailing from Bengal, his military career
was mostly spent in the violent North-West Frontier Province of India, participating in the Waziristan war
in 1920. After the campaign, he was transferred to the 17th Poona Horse (Queen Victoria's Own), as an
army inspector but left active service to join the Indian Political Service (IPS) in August 1926. His first
assignment was posted in Aligarh in Uttar Pradesh as an assistant commissioner before posting as
political agent in Hazara in the North West Frontier Province.He received promotion to Captain on 17
October 1927.
From 1928–33, Mirza spent time as political agent in the troubled Tribal belt, having served as an
assistant commissioner in the districts of Dera Ismail Khan in April 1928, Tonk in May 1928, Bannu in
April 1930, and Nowshera in April 1931. In 1931, Captain Mirza was appointed a district officer and later
posted as deputy commissioner at Hazara in May 1933, where he served for three years until a posting to
Mardan as assistant commissioner from October 1936 (deputy commissioner from January
1937).Promoted to major on 16 July 1938,[16] he became the political agent of the Tribal Belt in April
1938, stationed at Khyber. He remained there until 1945.

Mirza was appointed and served as the political agent of Odisha and North West Frontier Province from
1945 until 1946. He was promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel on 16 July 1946. His ability to run the colonial
administrative units had brought him to prominence that prompted the British Indian Government to
appoint him as the Joint Defence Secretary of India in 1946. In this position, he was responsible for
dividing the British Indian Army into the future armies of Pakistan and India. Around this time, he
became closer to Liaquat Ali Khan and began formatting political relations with the politicians of the
Muslim League. About him Abdul Ghaffar Khan wrote: ""According to my instructions the mass
movement was launched. A Muslim Deputy-Commissjoner, Janab Iskander Mirza, avowing his
traditional loyalty to the British, excelled his masters, beating to death Syed Akbar, a Khudai Khidmatgar.
He went to the extent of poisoning vegetables in a Khudai Khidmatgar camp. Those who ate them were
taken seriously ill. I would rather not expose his other crimes but would rather produce him before the
Almighty, whom we all have to face on the Day of judgment.

Political career in Pakistan:

Defence Secretary (1947–50):

As the partition of India took place by the United Kingdom, Colonel
Mirza played a substantial role in a committee that was responsible for dividing British India's Army,
Navy and Air Force into the future militaries of India and Pakistan.

He was appointed as first Defence Secretary in the Liaquat administration by the Prime Minister Liaquat
Ali Khan, who relied on running the government on British viceregal model with close coordination of
civilian bureaucracy, the police and the military. As Defence Secretary, he oversaw the military efforts in
the first war with India in 1947, as well as witnessing the failed secession in Balochistan by Khan of
Kalat.

In 1950, Mirza was promoted to two-star rank, having skipped the one-star promotion as Brigadier, and
upgraded his rank as Major-General in the Pakistan Army by the promotion papers approved by Prime
Minister Ali Khan.[9]:124 He was appointed as Colonel Commandant of the Military Police while
serving as the Defence secretary in the Liaquat administration.[9]:125–126 In 1951, Prime minister Ali
Khan appointed him as the director of the Department of Kashmir and Afghanistan Affairs (DKA).

His tenure as defense secretary also saw the deployment of Military Police in East Pakistan (now
Bangladesh) as a result of the Bengali Language Movement, during which the East Pakistan Rifles fatally
shot four student activists.[citation needed] Within a short span of time, the Military Police had the
control of the state and its officer commanding submitted the report of their course of action to Major
General Iskander Mirza in 1954.

In 1951, he backed the Liaquat administration's decision of appointing the native chiefs of staff of the
army, air force and navy, and dismissed deputation appointments from the British military.For the four-
star appointment, the Army GHQ sent the nomination papers to Prime Minister's Secretariat that included
four-senior major-generals in the race for the army command of the Pakistan Army: Major-General
Iftikhar Khan, Major-General Akbar Khan, Major-General Ishfakul Majid, and Major-General N.A.M.
Raza.

Initially, it was Major-General Iftikhar Khan who was promoted to four-star rank and selected to be
appointed as first native commander of the army but died in an airplane crash en route after finishing the
senior staff officers' course in the United Kingdom. All three remaining major-generals were bypassed
including the recommended senior-most Major-General Akbar Khan and Major-General Ishfakul Majid
due to Major-General Mirza's lobbying for the army selection when he presented convincing arguments to
Prime Minister Ali Khan to promote the junior-most Major-General Ayub Khan to the post despite the
fact that his name was not included in the nomination list. Ayub's papers of promotion were
controversially approved and appointed as the first native Commander-in-Chief of the Pakistan Army
with a promotion to the rank of Lieutenant General (acting full General) on 17 January 1951 by Prime
Minister Ali Khan.

With Ayub becoming the army chief, it marked the change in the military tradition of preferring native
Pakistanis and ending the transitional role of British Army officers. In 1951 also, he also helped elevating
Commodore M.S. Choudhri to the promotion to two-star rank, Rear-Admiral, in order to assume the navy
command of Pakistan Navy, but it was not until in 1953 when Admiral Choudhri took over the command.

Governorship of East Bengal and Cabinet Minister (1954–55):

Iskander Mirza meeting the Shah of
Iran, as the Governor General of PakistanDue to rapid political instability in East Bengal, Mirza was
relieved as Defence Secretary and took over the governorship of East Bengal, in an appointment approved
by then Governor-General Sir Malik Ghulam on 29 May 1954.

On 1 June 1954, Mirza took over the Government of East Bengal from Chief Minister A. K. Fazlul Huq
as part of the governor rule that dismiss the United Front. He imposed the martial law, backed by the East
Pakistan Rifles and dismissed the East Bengal Legislative Assembly.

After landing at the Shahjalal International Airport, Mirza sharply announced in Bengali language to the
Pakistan media representatives, that he would not hesitate to use force in order to establish peace in the
province, and personally threatening Maulana Bhashani of shooting him.

Iskander Mirza ruled East Pakistan with an iron fist, having arrested 319–659 political activists on his
first week, including Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Yusuf Ali Chowdhury.

By mid-June 1954, the number of arrests reached 1,051, including 33 assembly members and two Dhaka
University professors. His authoritative actions had sown a permanent seed of hatred for the Pakistani
government in the hearts of the people of East Pakistan despite the fact that Mirza was himself an ethnic
Bengali. Amid criticism at the public level in Pakistan led Mirza of relieving him from the post of
Governorship to East Bengal to Muhammad Shahabuddin in June 1955. He was the first Bengali to be
governor of East Pakistan. On 24 October 1954, he was appointed as Interior Minister in the Bogra
administration of Prime Minister Mohammad Ali Bogra. During this time, he had maintained close
political ties to the United States's establishment and was backed by Governor-General Sir Malik Ghulam
for this post, which Mirza only remained until 7 August 1955.

As an Interior Minister, he provided strong political advocacy for the controversial geopolitical program,
One-unit, which he faced strong criticism in the West Pakistan's politicians and the public in general.

Governor-General of Pakistan (1955–56):

In Bogra administration, he also took care the matters of
Commonwealth and Kashmir affairs ministry as he had gained major political influence in the
administration in 1955.[34] During this time, Governor-General Malik Ghulam survived another fatal
attack of Paralysis that made him unable to talk and walk, seeking treatment in the United Kingdom on a
two-month leave.
Appointed only as acting governor-general since 7 August 1955, Mirza dismissed Malik Ghulam to take
over his post on 6 October 1955, and forced Prime Minister Bogra to resign when he appointed him as the
Pakistan Ambassador to the United States. On 12 August 1955, he invited Muhammad Ali, the Finance
Minister, to take over the government as a prime minister.

Iskander Mirza, being sworn in as the first President of Pakistan:

The newly constituted Electoral
College unanimously elected Mirza as the first president upon the promulgation of the first set of the
Constitution on 23 March 1956. The coalition of the Awami League, the Muslim League, and the
Republic Party endorsed his presidency.

The Constitution drives the country's system of government towards parliamentarianism, with executive
powers vested under the elected Prime Minister while the president serving as a ceremonial head of state.

On 12 September 1956, he established and became vice-president of the Republican Party that was in
direct conflict with Muslim League, mainly due to disagreement on the idea of republicanism and
conservatism. Unable to keep the substantial pressure on Mirza's Republic Party eventually led the
Muslim League's successful demand for the resignation of Prime Minister Muhammad Ali on 12
September 1956.

Upon these development, President Mirza invited Awami League to form the central government that
appointed Huseyn Suhrawardy as the Prime Minister, who made an alliance with the Republican Party, to
take over the charge of the government.

Shah of Iran's first state visit to Pakistan:

Despite Mirza and Suhrawardy both being Bengalis and
hailing from East Bengal, the two leaders had very different views of running the central government and
both leader were in brief conflict, causing the harm to the unity of the nation. Prime Minister Suhrawardy
found extremely difficult to govern effectively due to the issue of One Unit, alleviating the national
economy, and President Mirza's constant unconstitutional interference in Suhrawardy administration.

President Mirza demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Suhrawardy and turned down his request to
seek motion of confidence at the National Assembly.[37] Threatened by President Mirza's dismissal,
Prime Minister Suhrawardy tendered his resignation on 17 October 1957 and was succeeded by I. I.
Chundrigar but he too was forced to resigned in mere two months.

President Mirza had widely lacked the parliamentary spirit, distrusting the civilians to ensure the integrity
and sovereignty of country. His unconstitutional interference in the civil administration made the elected
prime ministers effectively unable to function the government, as he had dismissed four elected prime
ministers in matter of two years.On his last nomination, he appointed Feroz Khan as the seventh Prime
Minister of the country, who had been supported by the Awami League and the Muslim League.

Martial law:
After the legislative elections held in 1954, the Awami League had been successfully
negotiating with the Muslim League for a power-sharing to form the national government against the
Republican Party.

By 1958, I.I. Chundrigar and A.Q. Khan had successfully reorganized the Muslim League that was
threatening the reelection and the political endorsement for Mirza for his second term of the presidency.
Furthermore, the Republican Party presided by Prime Minister Sir Feroze Khan had been under pressured
over the electoral reforms issue at the National Assembly. Upon witnessing these developments, President
Mirza ordered the mass mobilization of the military and imposed emergency in the country after declaring
the martial law against his own party's administration led by Prime Minister Feroze Khan by abrogating
the writ of the Constitution and dissolving the national and provisional assemblies on the midnight of 7/8
October 1958.

In morning of 8 October 1958, President Mizra announced via national radio that he was introducing a
new constitution "more suited to the genius of the Pakistan nation",as he believed democracy was
unsuited to Pakistan "with its 15% literacy rate". Upon abdicating, Mirza took the nation into confidence,
saying that:
Three weeks ago, I (Iskander Mirza) imposed martial law in Pakistan and appointed General Ayub Khan
as Supreme Commander of the [Armed Forces] and also as Chief Martial Law Administrator.... By the
grace of God... This measure which I had adopted in the interest of our beloved country has been
extremely well received by our people and by our friends and well wishers abroad... I have done best to
administer in the difficult task of arresting further deterioration and bringing order out of chaos... In our
efforts to evolve an effective structure for future administration of this country... Pakistan Zindabad,
Pakistan Zindabad!

 President Iskander Mirza, abdicating on 1958.10.27,:

This martial law imposed by country's first
Bengali president was the first example of martial law in Pakistan, which would continue until the
dissolution of East Pakistan in 1971. Iskander Mirza appointed then-Army Commander of the Pakistan
Army, General Ayub Khan, as the Chief Martial Law Administrator (CMLA), which proved his undoing
within three weeks.

Dismissal and end of presidency:

The two-man rule political regime was evolved under President
Mirza and his appointed chief martial law administration and then-army chief General Ayub Khan.
However, the two men had very different point of view on running the government with the new
situation, even though they were responsible for bringing about the change.

I did not mean to do it.... The martial law would be for the shortest possible duration until the new
elections....

 President Mirza, 1958:

President Mirza had not envisaged any change in his previous powers; he
wanted to retain the ability to maneuver things in keeping with his own whims. Judging from the
situation, the things however had changed as the time and situation both were demanding the complete
solution. General Ayub Khan came to an understanding that the real political power rested with the
support from the military, and within a week of enforcing the martial law, President Mirza realized the
delicate position he got himself into. In an interview with Dawn, President Mirza regretted his decision
saying: "I did not mean to do it" while offering assurances that the martial law would be for the shortest
possible duration.
In 1959, President Mirza accepted the resignation of Vice-Admiral M.S. Choudhri, replacing with Vice-
Admiral A.R. Khan as the new naval chief but the civil-military relations continued to be a dominant
factor between President Mirza and General Ayub Khan.

In an attempt to consolidate the powers under his control, President Mirza appointed a new administration
cabinet that consisted of bureaucrats and technocrats and unsuccessfully tried by role of the CMLA
General Ayub Khan as the Prime Minister on 24 October 1958 but such actions could not implemented
due to General Ayub Khan's strong protest and briefly lodged a complain to President Mirza about his
"high hand" method.

The new administration did not satisfy CMLA Ayub Khan who had more control in the administration
than President Mirza. Ayub dispatched the military unit to enter in presidential palace on the midnight of
26–27 October 1958 and placed him in an airplane to exile in England.Subsequently, Admiral A. R. Khan
and four army and air force generals: Azam, Amir, Wajid, and Asghar Khan were instrumental in the
demise of President Mirza.

Iskander Mirza's State Funeral in Tehran's Sepahsalar Mosque, Iran:

Exiled in 1959, Mirza lived
a remainder of his life in exile in London, England where he financially struggled running a small
Pakistan cuisine hotel until his death. It was reported widely by Pakistani media that despite hailing from
a wealthy Nawab and aristocrat family, Mirza lived in poverty in England and his regular income was
based on retired pension of £3,000 as a former military officer and president. Foreign dignitaries such as
Ardeshir Zahedi, Shah of Iran, Lord Inchcape, Lord Hume, and Pakistani billionaires in London had made
his life in exile tolerable.

At the London hospital where he died, he once said to his wife, Nahid: "We cannot afford medical
treatment, so just let me die."

He died of a heart attack on 13 November 1969, his 70th birthday, and President Yahya Khan denied him
a burial in East Pakistan. The Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi sent his personal plane to London to bring
President Mirza's body to Tehran, where he was given a state funeral. Hundreds of Iranians, including
Prime Minister Abbas Hoveyda, and Pakistani expatriates in Iran bade farewell and offered their prayers.

The funeral ceremony was marred by the absence of Iskander Mirza's relatives living in Pakistan. The
military government barred them from leaving Pakistan in time despite the best efforts by Ardeshir
Zahedi, Iran's foreign minister, and President Iskander Mirza's friends in Pakistan and Iran. There are
unfounded rumors that after the Islamic Revolution in Iran (1979), his grave was desecrated.
References:

 Rahman, Syedur (2010). Historical Dictionary of Bangladesh. Plymouth, UK: Scarecrow Press.
p. li. ISBN 978-0-8108-7453-4. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
 Jump up to: a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v "Teething Years: Iskander Mirza". Story of
Pakistan. June 2003. Retrieved 1 February 2012.
 Jump up to: a b c d "President Iskandar Mirza". Ministry of Information and Public
Broadcasting. Government of Pakistan. Archived from the original on 16 January 2014.
Retrieved 1 February 2012.
 Roraback, Amanda (2004). Pakistan in a Nutshell. Enisen Publishing. p. 16. ISBN
9780970290892. Retrieved 30 March 2017.
 Lentz, Harris M. (2014). Heads of States and Governments Since 1945 (google books). New
York City: Routledge. p. 1896. ISBN 9781134264971. Retrieved 20 January 2018.
 Baxter, Craig (1997). Bangladesh: From a Nation to a State. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. pp.
23, 64. ISBN 978-0-8133-2854-6. Members and collaterals of the [Murshidabad] nawab family
have been prominent in Pakistani politics, including Iskandar Mirza ... Mirza was a member of
the Murshidabad family of Sirajuddaulah."
 Salīm, Aḥmad (1997). Iskander Mirza: Rise and Fall of a President. Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan:
Gora Publishers. pp. 15–18. OCLC 254567097. Retrieved 20 January 2018.
 Streissguth, Thomas (2008). Bangladesh in Pictures. Twenty-First Century Books. p. 27. ISBN
978-0-8225-8577-0. Retrieved 31 March 2017.