Chaudhry Zahoor Ilahi, a Jat of the Warriach clan, was assassinated on September 25, 1981.He was a seasoned Pakistani politician who rose to prominence from a small town of Gujrat. He began his career in the police department as a constable but soon gave it up after the creation of Pakistan. He ventured into business in association with his older brother, Chaudhry Manzoor Ilahi, a textile engineer by profession. The two brothers jointly purchased and operated textile mills in Gujrat after the independence of Pakistan.
Ilahi entered local politics in the 1950s during Ayub Khan’s rule. During that period, Governor of West Pakistan, Nawab Ameer Mohammad Khan of Kalabagh, was Ilahi’s opponent. As the secretary general of the convention of the Muslim League, Ilahi came to oppose Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. In his conflict with Bhutto, Ilahi was imprisoned and the government confiscated his family property. A terrorist group that allegedly had links to the Bhutto family assassinated Ilahi in 1981.
Chaudhry Zahoor Ilahi’s father, Chaudhry Sardar Warraich, was a great admirer of Sufism and Punjabi Sufi poetry. That is why Sufism touched the spirit of Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain. Chaudhry Manzoor Ilahi, father of Chaudhry Parvez Ilahi, is the older brother of Ilahi. He was raised in Gujrat but left his hometown in 1939 to pursue further studies. He received his degree in textile engineering from Amritsar in 1940. Upon his return from Amritsar, Manzoor teamed with Ilahi to develop a family owned textile business in Gujrat.
After independence in 1947, the two brothers established two textile units: Gujrat Silk Mills and Pakistan Textile Mills. In 1950, the business was expanded to Lahore where they established the Parvez Textile Mills, specialising in weaving, finishing and dyeing. In 1951-52, Manzoor went to Japan to import textile machinery for Gujrat and Lahore units. Armed with his textile education and business skills, Manzoor’s textile units continued to flourish under his leadership. The family continued to dedicate their energies to their business and set up Modern Flour Mills in Lahore and Rawalpindi.
In 1956, Ilahi decided to enter politics while Manzoor was running family business. Ilahi was elected the chairman of the Gujrat District Board in 1958. The same year, Ilahi was also elected as a director of the National Bank of Pakistan. He kept returning to the National Bank’s board of directors for the next twelve years.
In 1958, General Ayub Khan imposed martial law. He enforced the ‘Elected Bodies Disqualification Order’ (EBDO), which was used to disqualify politicians for the next five years. The politicians facing (EBDO) were given two options. They were either to retire voluntarily from politics or to face government’s punitive action. Ilahi was the only politician who challenged the draconian EBDO. Despite being cleared by the EBDO tribunal of all charges, Ilahi was victimised by the martial law regime and was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment.
Tragically, Ilahi became the first victim of Al-Zulfiqar when he was assassinated in Lahore on September 25, 1981
Despite that, Ilahi was elected as the member of the National Assembly in 1962; he consequently became the secretary general of the Pakistan Muslim League’s Parliamentary Party of United Pakistan.
Around that time, the family also purchased Pakistan Times, an English daily published from West Pakistan. Ilahi was elected to the National Assembly in 1970. He was among the few members of the Pakistan Muslim League to get elected. Followed by the fall of East Pakistan in 1971, Bhutto emerged as the new ruler of the remaining Pakistan.
On his coming to power, Bhutto nationalised all major industries including flourmills. Ilahi was among the nine opposition parliamentary leaders forcibly thrown out of parliament on Bhutto’s orders. From ludicrous and politically motivated police cases, such as the alleged buffalo theft case to the farfetched case of supply of Iraqi arms for rebellion in Balochistan, Ilahi was constantly targeted and implicated in several fabricated cases during Bhutto’s rule.
But this could not silence Ilahi. He was arrested for delivering an anti-government speech in the Hotel Inter Continental, Karachi, and a special tribunal sentenced him to imprisonment for five years. He remained imprisoned in different jails but mostly at the Karachi jail.
The Pakistan National Alliance (PNA) gained momentum following 1977. All top PNA leaders including Ilahi were arrested. Ilahi and others were released when after the military coup General Zia-ul-Haq took over on July 5, 1977. Zia immediately announced holding of fresh elections within 90 days. Ilahi filed his nomination papers from Gujrat and constituency number three of Lahore from where Bhutto had also declared to contest. However, those elections were postponed when Zia arrested Bhutto. Due to the deteriorating financial plight of the nationalised industries, Zia’s government decided to return them to their original owners. The Chaudhry family took charge of their previously nationalised flourmills.
Following General Zia-ul-Haq’s actions against the Bhutto family, Murtaza Bhutto formed the Al-Zulfiqar. A close associate of Bhutto,the former governor of Punjab, Ghulam Mustafa Khar, in exile in London, informed a close friend of Ilahi of Al-Zulfiqar’s a plot to assassinate Ilahi. Tragically, Ilahi became the first victim of Al-Zulfiqar when he was assassinated in Lahore on September 25, 1981. Later, Al-Zulfiqar chief, Murtaza Bhutto, publicly accepted responsibility of the assassination in his interview with BBC.
At that juncture, the Chaudhry family decided that Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and Chaudhry Parvez Ilahi, sons of Chaudhry Zahoor Ilahi and Chaudhry Manzoor Ilahi, should take charge of the family business as well as enter politics. Since then the leaders of the Pakistan Muslim League, the Chaudhrys of Gujrat have been focusing on national and international affairs far better than any other.
The writer an Islamabad-based book ambassador, columnist, political analyst and author of several books