| Multan has been served by its historians. They have over the years popularized the callous adage that the four most memorable things about Multan were its dust, heat, beggars and graves’. In doing so they have undermined Multan’s own monumental credentials to being not only an important city of the Punjab but a strategic bastion of Islam in the sub-continent. |
| Accounts of Multan, recorded in the main by outsiders, rarely yield to readers interested in its history the pertinent insight they yearn for and which contemporary chronicles often grudgingly provide. The publication of any new source therefore is to be welcomed, particularly when it is presented with an erudite and informative introduction by Mr. Ahmad Nabi Khan, a perceptive historian and expert in the field. |
| Mr. Khan has discovered the ‘Zubdat al-Akhbar’ a treatise on the Saddozai rulers of Multan written in Persian by Munishi Sher Muhammad Nadir, an official in the retinue of Nawab Sarfraz Khan. The dispossessed Nawab had lived for some years in Lahore as an unwilling hostage at Ranjit Singh’s court after the defeat of his father Nawab Muzaffar Khan in 1818. The significance of this treasure lies in its authorship by an insider within the Saddozai entourage. The manuscript now in the collection of the Research Society of Pakistan is a copy prepared after 1870 from the original text written in 1832. Its authenticity and relevance though are unquestioned. |
| In his Introduction Mr. Khan has traced the lineage of the Saddozais over a span of 250 years from their feudal service to the Safavid kings of Persia for whom they guarded the highways from Heart to Qandahar, through 1652 when the first Saddozai Shah Hussain migrated to Multan and was received in state by prince (later Emperor) Aurangzeb, until the traumatic fall of Multan to the Sikhs in 1818. |
| The Saddozai clan had maintained flexible contact with each freshly, emergent power in the Punjab plains. In 1748 Ahmed Shah Abdali confirmed Zahid Khan Saddozai as Governor of Multan and 15 years later, Ahmad Shah Durrani appointed Shuja Khan Saddozai. Zahid Khan’s younger son, as the Governor. By 1772, the Durrani ruler had died and his heir Timur Shah for a short while retained Haji Sharif Saddozai in the same capacity. |
| Multan though was too lucrative a prize not to tempt marauders. The Marathas ravaged it in 1759 but left enough to attract the Sikhs. On Id day, 27 December, 1772, the Bhangi Sikhs captured the citadel of Multan while its Governor and his forces were attending prayers. Multan remained in their hands until 1780 when the garrison was routed by Timur Shah Durrani, assisted by the young Saddozai Nawab Muzffar Khan. |
| For the next 38 years, Muzaffar Khan governed Multan with ability. After his death on 2nd June, 1818, defending the Multan citadel against the army sent by Ranjit Singh, his reputation as an administrator and man-of-arms was honoured as much as his name according to Burnes, was ‘revered as a saint’. After the Nawab’s death, two of his sons including Sarfraz Khan (patron of the scribe of the treatise under review) were brought to the Sikh Court at Lahore for display as war-trophies. The independence of the Saddozais had come to an end. |
| Their martial prowess and exploits, though, deserve recollection and have been recounted by Mr. Ahmad Nabi Khan in an impelling narrative. He has also by selective editing of the treatise broadened its dimensions and relevance, enhancing our understanding today of the Saddozai Afghans and of their influence on the history of Multan. |
Printed in OUTLOOK magazine, 29 May 1977. |
