خلک
People
Notable people
Writers, leaders, scholars and artists.
Articles on notable people
- Abdul Bari Jahani: Pashto poet of Kandahar and lyricist of the 2006 anthemAbdul Bari Jahani, born in Kandahar in 1948, is a Pashto poet who wrote the words of Afghanistan's national anthem, approved in 2006. He worked for the Voice of America and was minister of information and culture from April 2015 to November 2016.
- Abdul Malik Fida: Khudai Khidmatgar poet of Charsadda, died 1957Abdul Malik Fida was a Pashto poet of the Khudai Khidmatgar movement, from Pranghar in Charsadda. His poem "Death, do not come, I am coming" answers the shooting at Babra on 12 August 1948; he died in 1957.
- Abdul Qadir Khan Khattak: poet, soldier and translator, son of KhushalAbdul Qadir Khan Khattak, born 1652 by Raverty's reckoning, was Khushal Khan's most eloquent poet son, a Sufi ghazal writer and translator of Jami and Sa'di into Pashto, killed with ten brothers by his nephew Afzal Khan.
- Abdul Rauf Benawa: Kandahar poet, scholar and ministerAbdul Rauf Benawa (1913 to 1984 or 1985) was a Kandahar-born Pashto poet and scholar who led the Pashto Academy, compiled the dictionary of writers Osnai Likwal, served as minister of information and culture in 1967 and as ambassador to Libya from 1980.
- Abdul Samad Khan Achakzai (Khan Shaheed): Pashtun nationalist of BalochistanAbdul Samad Khan Achakzai of Gulistan founded the Anjuman-i-Watan in 1938, spent decades in prison under the British and Pakistan, and was martyred by grenades thrown into his Quetta bedroom on 2 December 1973.
- Abdur Rahman Khan: the amir who unified Afghanistan, 1880–19011844–1901Abdur Rahman Khan (امير عبدالرحمان خان), a grandson of Dost Mohammad, ruled Afghanistan as amir from 1880 to 1901 with a British subsidy, a standing army and great violence, crushing the Ghilzai and Hazara risings, conquering Kafiristan and agreeing the Durand Line in November 1893.
- Afzal Khan Khattak: Khattak chief and author of the Tarikh-i MurassaAfzal Khan Khattak (c. 1665 to c. 1740), grandson of Khushal Khan Khattak and son of Ashraf Khan Hijri, was a Khattak chief and wrote the Tarikh-i Murassa, the first large Pashto history, a chronicle of the Khattak chiefs that Raverty, Plowden and Caroe all drew on.
- Ahmad Shah Durrani's diwan: the king's Pashto poemsAhmad Shah Durrani, founder of the Durrani kingdom, also wrote a diwan of Pashto odes, Sufi in tone. Raverty translated twelve in 1862, and Abdul Hai Habibi edited them from three manuscripts at Kabul in 1940.
- Aimal Khan and Darya Khan: the tribal leaders of the 1672 Khyber risingAimal Khan and Darya Khan led the Afridi and Mohmand tribes that defeated the Mughal governor Muhammad Amin Khan's army in the Khyber Pass in April 1672 and fought beside Khushal Khan Khattak for years after.
- Ajmal Khattak: Pashto poet, National Awami Party leader and exile in KabulAjmal Khattak (1925–2010) of Akora Khattak was a Khudai Khidmatgar and Pashto poet whose first book, Da Ghairat Chagha, was banned in Pakistan and Afghanistan. After Liaquat Bagh in 1973 he lived in exile in Kabul until 1989, then led the Awami National Party.
- Akhund Darweza: Pashto writer of the Makhzan and opponent of Pir RoshanAkhund Darweza (1533–1638 in Pelevin's dates), a disciple of Pir Baba of Buner, wrote the Pashto Makhzan, which argues against Bayazid Ansari, and in Leyden's, Caroe's and Raverty's accounts gave him the name Pir Tarik. Raverty credits him with arranging Pashto spelling. He is buried at Peshawar.
- Akhund Panju Baba of Akbarpura, NowsheraAkhund Panju Baba (Syed Abdul Wahab) is a Sufi teacher buried at Akbarpura near Nowshera, remembered for the stone mosque he is said to have founded, which is slowly sinking into the ground.
- Amanullah Khan: independence, reform and the crisis of 19291892–1960Amanullah Khan (1892–1960) ruled Afghanistan from 1919 to 1929. He won full independence from Britain in the Treaty of Rawalpindi of 8 August 1919 and gave the country its first constitution in 1923, but risings forced him to abdicate and he died in exile.
- Amir Habibullah Khan, 1901–1919Habibullah Khan, eldest son of Abdur Rahman, ruled Afghanistan from 1901 until he was shot dead at Kalagosh on 20 February 1919. He signed the 1905 treaty on terms close to his own draft, opened Habibia College and kept the country neutral in the First World War.
- Arzani Khweshki: Roshani poet and disciple of Pir RoshanMulla Arzani, a disciple of Bayazid Ansari (Pir Roshan), wrote Pashto ghazals about 1600 and is among the earliest Pashto poets with a Diwan. A nineteenth-century copy of 49 of his odes is in the British Library.
- Ashraf Khan Hijri: Khattak chief and poet of exile at BijapurAshraf Khan Khattak, eldest son of Khushal Khan Khattak, became chief of the Khattaks, was, in Raverty's account, betrayed by his brother Bahram to Aurangzeb, and died a prisoner at Bijapur about 1693, writing Pashto poems as Hijri, 'the separated'.
- Daulat Lawanai: Roshani poet of the seventeenth centuryDaulat Lawanai (Dawlat), a Pashto poet who called himself a disciple of Mian Roshan, was alive in 1648. His diwan, lost to Raverty in 1862, was first printed at Kabul in 1974 and holds Pashto ghazals in Persian metres.
- Dost Mohammad Khan: the amir who rebuilt Afghanistan1792–1863Dost Mohammad Khan (1792 to 1863), a Mohammadzai Barakzai born in Kandahar, made himself master of Kabul in 1826, lost his throne to the British invasion of 1839, returned in 1842 and by his death at Herat on 9 June 1863 had brought nearly all of present-day Afghanistan under one government.
- Dr Khan Sahib (Khan Abdul Jabbar Khan): chief minister of the Frontier and of West PakistanDr Khan Sahib, the elder brother of Bacha Khan, was a doctor from Utmanzai who led the Congress ministry of the North-West Frontier Province until his dismissal on 22 August 1947, and became the first chief minister of West Pakistan. He was assassinated in Lahore on 9 May 1958.
- Ghani Khan (Abdul Ghani Khan): Pashto poet, painter and son of Bacha KhanGhani Khan (1914–1996), eldest son of Bacha Khan, wrote Pashto poetry under the pen name Lewanay Falsafi, the Mad Philosopher, and painted and sculpted. Pakistan jailed him from 1948 to 1954, and the poems he wrote there became his first collection.
- Ghulam Muhammad Tarzi: Kandahar sardar, Persian poet and exile in DamascusSardar Ghulam Muhammad Khan Tarzi (born Kandahar 1245 AH, died Damascus December 1900), a Mohammadzai sardar and poet, was expelled by Abdur Rahman, accused of backing Ayub Khan, and lived in Karachi, Baghdad and Damascus. He was the father of Mahmud Tarzi.
- Gul Pacha Ulfat: Pashto poet, editor and head of the Pashto Tolana, 1909–1977Gul Pacha Ulfat (1909–1977), born in Laghman, was a Pashto poet and prose writer who edited papers, led the Pashto Academy from 1956–57, sat in the National Assembly and was minister for tribal affairs in 1963.
- Hafizullah Amin: Khalq organiser and president of Afghanistan, 1979Hafizullah Amin, a Kharoti Ghilzai teacher from Paghman, organised the Khalq officers behind the April 1978 coup, took power from Taraki in September 1979 and was killed by Soviet special forces at the Tajbeg palace on 27 December 1979.
- Halima Khattak (Bibi Halima): daughter of Khushal Khan, Sufi poetHalima Khattak, Bibi Halima the hafiza, is remembered as a Pashto poet, a daughter of Khushal Khan Khattak and sister of Abdul Qadir. All of it comes from the Pata Khazana, published in 1944, whose authenticity is disputed.
- Hamid Baba (Abdul Hamid Mohmand): the Pashto poet of MashokhelAbdul Hamid Mohmand, Hamid Baba, was a Pashto poet and teacher of the Kudrizi Mohmand from Mashokhel near Peshawar, whom Persians called "the Hair-splitter". His dates are unsettled: Raverty put his death about 1732 in 1862 and in the reign of Timur Shah in 1860.
- Hamza Shinwari (Hamza Baba): Baba-e-Ghazal of the Khyber, 1907–1994Amir Hamza Khan Shinwari, Hamza Baba, was a Shinwari poet of Lwargai near Landi Kotal and a Chishti disciple, called Baba-e-Ghazal for his Pashto ghazal. He also wrote for radio and the first Pashto film, and died on 18 February 1994.
- Hashim Khan and Shah Mahmud Khan: the uncles who governed Afghanistan, 1929–1953Mohammad Hashim Khan and Shah Mahmud Khan, brothers of Nadir Shah and uncles of Zahir Shah, ruled Afghanistan as prime ministers: Hashim from 1929 to 1946, Shah Mahmud from 1946 until Daoud replaced him in September 1953.
- Kaka Sahib (Sheikh Rahmkar), died 1653Kaka Sahib, Sayyid Kastir Gul, called Sheikh Rahmkar, was a Sufi teacher of the Khattak country near Nowshera who died in 1653. His grave at Ziarat Kaka Sahib draws an annual urs, and his descendants are the Kakakhel.
- Kazim Khan Shaida: the Khattak poet of RampurKazim Khan Shaida was an eighteenth-century Pashto poet, a great-grandson of Khushal Khan Khattak, who left the Khattak country as a youth and lived at Rampur among the Rohillas. Raverty found his odes the closest to Persian verse of any Pashto poet.
- Khan Abdul Qayyum Khan: chief minister of the Frontier, 1947–1953Khan Abdul Qayyum Khan (1901–1981) left the Congress for the Muslim League in 1945 and led the North-West Frontier Province from 23 August 1947 to 1953. His ministry built the University of Peshawar and banned the Khudai Khidmatgar after Babra.
- Khan Abdul Wali Khan: leader of the National Awami Party and the Awami National PartyKhan Abdul Wali Khan, son of Bacha Khan, led the National Awami Party from 1968, whose governments in the Frontier and Balochistan fell in 1973, and was tried in the Hyderabad conspiracy case. He founded the Awami National Party in 1986 and died on 26 January 2006.
- Khatir Afridi (Misri Khan): Pashto ghazal poet of the Khyber, 1929–1968Khatir Afridi, born Misri Khan, was an Afridi poet of the Khyber who never went to school but became one of the best-loved Pashto ghazal writers. He is usually said to have died young, on 24 August 1968.
- Malalai of Maiwand: heroine of the Battle of MaiwandMalalai (ملالۍ) is the Pashtun heroine of the Battle of Maiwand, 27 July 1880. In the Afghan telling she raised the fallen flag of Ayub Khan's army, rallied the fighters with a landay and was martyred on the field; Afghan schools and a state medal bear her name.
- Mian Umar Chamkani, Sufi of Peshawar (Mian Umar Baba)Mian Muhammad Umar Chamkani, Mian Umar Baba, was a Naqshbandi Sufi of Chamkani near Peshawar, said by his shrine to have died in 1776 aged 105. A holy man of Chamkani figured in the 1779 plot against Timur Shah.
- Miangul Abdul Wadud (Badshah Sahib), founder of the Swat StateMiangul Abdul Wadud, the Akhund's grandson known as Badshah Sahib, founded the Swat State in 1917, was recognised by the British as its first Wali in 1926 and abdicated in 1949.
- Mirwais Hotak: the Ghilzai chief who freed Kandahar in 1709Mirwais Hotak (Mir Wais, died 1715), chief of a Hotak Ghilzai tribe and kalantar of Kandahar, killed the Safavid governor Gorgin Khan in 1709 and beat the armies sent to retake the city. He is buried at Kokaran and remembered as Mirwais Nika.
- Mirza Khan Ansari: Roshani poet of Pir Roshan's familyMirza Khan Ansari was a seventeenth-century Pashto poet of the family of Pir Roshan, whose mystical diwan Raverty translated in 1862. His descent, his dates and his death are told differently by Raverty and Caroe.
- Mohammad Daoud Khan: prime minister and first president of Afghanistan, 1909–1978Sardar Mohammad Daoud Khan, cousin of King Zahir Shah, ran Afghanistan as prime minister from 1953 to 1963, overthrew the monarchy in 1973 and was killed with most of his family in the coup of 27 and 28 April 1978.
- Mohammad Nadir Shah: general, king and the Charkhi feud, 1883–1933Mohammad Nadir Khan (1883–1933), the Musahiban general of Thal in 1919, took Kabul from Habibullah Kalakani in October 1929 with frontier lashkars, ruled as king until a student shot him on 8 November 1933.
- Mohammad Najibullah: KHAD chief and last Soviet-era president of AfghanistanMohammad Najibullah (1947–1996), an Ahmadzai Pashtun from Paktia, ran the KHAD secret police from 1980 and was president of Afghanistan from 1987 to 1992. The Taliban killed him on 27 September 1996, four years after he took refuge in the UN compound in Kabul.
- Mohammad Zahir Shah: the last king of Afghanistan, 1914–2007Mohammad Zahir Shah (1914–2007) was king of Afghanistan from 1933, ruled through his uncles and cousin until 1963, gave the country its 1964 constitution, was deposed by Daoud in 1973, and returned from Rome in 2002 as "Father of the Nation".
- Mulla Mushk-i Alam (Din Muhammad) of GhazniMulla Din Muhammad, called Mushk-i Alam, was an Andar Ghilzai religious teacher of Ghazni who called the tribes to jihad in December 1879 and was to light the beacon for the attack on Sherpur. He died in December 1885 by the Hijri date in the court chronicle, though several books say 1886.
- Mullah Powindah of the Shabi Khel Mahsud (died 1913)Mullah Powindah (Mulla Powinda, Muhiyuddin, died 1913), a Shabi Khel Mahsud religious leader of Marobi, led Mahsud opposition to British rule in Waziristan from 1894 until his death; British officials held him responsible for the Wana attack of that year.
- Nazo Tokhi (Nazo Ana): poet and mother of Mirwais HotakNazo Tokhi, called Nazo Ana, is remembered as a Pashto poet and as the mother of Mirwais Hotak. Her story rests on one disputed book, the Pata Khazana, published in 1944; it gives her family, a dream, a fortress story and one quatrain.
- Nur Muhammad Taraki: Pashto writer and founder of the PDPA, 1917–1979Nur Muhammad Taraki (1917–1979), a Pashto writer from Nawa in Ghazni, founded the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan in 1965, headed the government after the April 1978 coup, and was overthrown by Hafizullah Amin in September 1979 and killed in October.
- Pir Baba of Buner (Sayyid Ali Tirmizi), 1502–1583Sayyid Ali Tirmizi, called Pir Baba, was a Sufi teacher from Tirmiz who settled among the Yusufzai of Buner, taught Akhund Darweza and opposed the Roshaniyya. His tomb at Pacha is one of the great shrines of the frontier.
- Pir Muhammad Kakar: Pashto poet of Kandahar and author of Ma'rifat al-AfghaniPir Muhammad Kakar was a Pashto poet and teacher at Kandahar in Ahmad Shah Durrani's time. He wrote Ma'rifat al-Afghani in 1186 AH (1773 by Kushev), the earliest Pashto teaching book Kushev lists, and a diwan of about 5,000 couplets.
- Pir Muhammad Karwan: Pashto poet of Khost and the Peshawar exilePir Muhammad Karwan (born 1338 SH, about 1959) is a Pashto poet and short-story writer from Narizi in Tani, Khost, who wrote in exile at Peshawar from 1990 and for radio and drama. His first book of poems is From Evening to Evening.
- Pir Roshan (Bayazid Ansari): founder of the Roshaniyya and author of the Khair al-BayanBayazid Ansari, called Pir Roshan (born at Jalandhar in the 1520s to a Kaniguram family), founded the Roshaniyya, an order that fought the Mughals from Tirah, and wrote the Khair al-Bayan, the oldest surviving Pashto work. His opponent Akhund Darweza renamed him Pir Tarik.
- Poets of the Khudai Khidmatgar: Pashto verse of the Red Shirt movementThe Khudai Khidmatgar movement had its own paper, Pakhtun (1928), and poets who wrote for it: Fazal Mahmood Makhfi, Abdul Akbar Khan Akbar, Abdul Malik Fida, Ghani Khan and Ajmal Khattak. The British banned the paper; Pakistan banned the movement after Babra in 1948.
- Qalandar Momand: Pashto poet, critic and lexicographer of PeshawarQalandar Momand (1930–2003) was a Pashto poet, story writer, critic and journalist of Peshawar, jailed for his left-wing views, who doubted the authenticity of the Pata Khazana and compiled the Pashto dictionary Daryab.
- Qiyamuddin Khadim: Pashto poet, critic and editor of the awakening generationQiyamuddin Khadim (born 1285 SH / about 1906–07 in Roohi's dates, 1907 in Adamec's; died 1979–80) was a Pashto poet, essayist and editor, a Pashto Society writer of the awakening period and later a senator in Kabul.
- Rahmat Shah Sayel (Sail): Pashto poet of Dargai and PeshawarRahmat Shah Sayel, also spelled Sail, is a Pashto poet from Wartier near Dargai in Malakand, born in 1949 or 1950, a tailor who left school after the third class. He edits the ANP's Pakhtun magazine in Peshawar and received a lifetime achievement award in 2024.
- Sardar Abdur Rab Nishtar: Muslim League leader from Peshawar, 1899–1958Sardar Abdur Rab Nishtar, a lawyer from Peshawar, sat for the Muslim League in the Interim Government of 1946–47, became Pakistan's first communications minister, governor of the Punjab (1949) and League president (1956). He died in Karachi on 14 February 1958.
- Sardar Ayub Khan: the victor of Maiwand, 1857–1914Sardar Mohammad Ayub Khan (1857–1914), son of Amir Sher Ali and governor of Herat, destroyed a British brigade at Maiwand on 27 July 1880, lost to Roberts at Kandahar that September, and died in exile at Lahore.
- Shaheed Maulana Khanzeb of Bajaur: scholar, author and ANP leaderShaheed Maulana Khanzeb (Khan Zeb) of Nawagai was a religious scholar, author of Shtamana Pakhtunkhwa, a 2024 Pashto book on the province's natural resources, and an Awami National Party leader. He was martyred in Khar, Bajaur, on 10 July 2025.
- Sher Ali Khan, amir of Afghanistan, 1863–1879Sher Ali Khan, son of Dost Mohammad, was amir of Afghanistan from 1863, lost Kabul in 1866, won it back in 1868, and died at Mazar-i Sharif on 21 February 1879 after the British invasion.
- Sulaiman Layeq: Pashto and Dari poet, PDPA founder and minister, 1930–2020Sulaiman Layeq (1930–2020) was a poet in Pashto and Dari, a founding member of the PDPA and author of its anthem, and under the Soviet-backed governments head of the Academy of Sciences and a minister.
- The Akhund of Swat (Saidu Baba), c. 1794–1877Abdul Ghafur, the Akhund of Swat or Saidu Baba, was a Sufi hermit and teacher from Upper Swat who became the most influential holy man of the Yusufzai country. He joined the Bunerwals against the British at Ambela in 1863 and died in January 1877.
- The Faqir of Ipi (Mirza Ali Khan) of WaziristanMirza Ali Khan, the Faqir of Ipi, was a Tori Khel Wazir religious leader who led resistance in Waziristan from the Islam Bibi case of 1936 until his death in April 1960, first against British rule and then against Pakistan.
- The Hadda Mulla (Najmuddin Akhundzada), died 1903Najmuddin Akhundzada, the Hadda Mulla, was a Sufi teacher near Jalalabad and a deputy of the Akhund of Swat. Driven out by Amir Abdur Rahman, he lived among the Mohmand and is named as the chief instigator of the 1897 frontier rising.
- The Haji Sahib of Turangzai (Fazl-i-Wahid), reformer and Mohmand leaderFazl-i-Wahid, the Haji Sahib of Turangzai (about 1859–1937), was a Sayyid religious leader from near Charsadda who ran village schools with Bacha Khan, left British India in 1915 and led Mohmand risings from Lakarai until his death.
- The Pir of Manki Sharif (Amin ul-Hasanat), 1922–1960Sayyid Muhammad Amin ul-Hasanat, the Pir of Manki Sharif, led the Frontier pirs into the Muslim League in 1945 and campaigned in the 1947 referendum. He was jailed in 1947 and left the League within a few years of Pakistan.
- Wasil Roshani: poet of the Roshani circle, seventeenth centuryWasil Roshani was a Pashto poet of Bayazid Ansari's circle, alive in the late 1640s. Khushal Khan Khattak named him, and his poems came to light only in 1974, in a Kandahar notebook.
- Wazir Akbar Khan: Dost Mohammad's son and the leader of 1841–42Wazir Muhammad Akbar Khan (1816–1847), son of Dost Mohammad Khan, fought at Jamrud in 1837 and led the Afghan side in 1841–42, shooting Sir William Macnaghten on 23 December 1841. He died in 1847, said to have been poisoned.
- Zainab Hotak (Bibi Zainab): sister of Shah Mahmud and Shah Hussain HotakZainab Hotak, Bibi Zainab, is remembered as a Pashto poet and a daughter of Mirwais Hotak, known for an elegy for her brother Shah Mahmud. All of it comes from the Pata Khazana, published in 1944, whose authenticity is disputed.