reform and repression, 1901–19coup. Later the government claimed that the conspirators were mostly
army officers, yet apart from Nazir Muhammad Safir Khan, none of the
alleged ringleaders held military rank.
Most of the accused had a family history of support for the ex-Amir
Ya‘qub Khan and several had held high office under Amir ‘Abd al-Rahman
Khan. Many came from Kandahar, while the religious scholars had been
educated in the royal madrasa, an institution set up by ‘Abd al-Rahman
Khan to train a body of loyal ‘ulama’ and to promote the form of Islam
that endorsed the monarch’s policies and offset radical, independent and
often anti-government religious leaders. Some of the alleged ringleaders
also played an active part in educational and legal reforms and had close
ties to Habibiyya College. The exception was Nazir Muhammad Safir,
who ideologically was aligned to the conservative Sunni party and was an
outspoken critic of Habibiyya College and the Amir’s education policies.
As such, Muhammad Safir was the last person to support a movement like
the Hizb-i Mashruta.
The evidence suggests that the Mashruta Conspiracy was in fact a
cover for something far more sinister. The night letter that precipitated
the witch-hunt appears to have been timed for maximum effect, for the
Amir was recovering from a severe bout of illness, one of the symptoms
of which was acute paranoia. The real plotters exploited the Amir’s mental
state, reckoning that the assassination plot would so terrify him that Habib
Allah Khan would order the arrest and execution of the conspirators with-
out bothering to determine the truth, or otherwise, of the allegations. This
is exactly what happened, and those who hatched the scheme had a free
hand to suppress and discredit the reformers and destroy their personal
enemies at the same time.
According to Dr Ghani’s account, the appointment of Indians to
run Habibiyya College created a great deal of jealously among powerful
indivi duals at court. Further hostility had been aroused when Dr Ghani’s
appointment as headmaster came at the expense of another Indian med -
ical doctor, Ghulam Nabi, who was sacked following a vicious campaign
of character assassination by Ghani’s two brothers. Once in charge of
Habibiyya, Dr Ghani dismissed all Dr Nabi’s appointees and replaced them
with his own nominees. Dr Ghani then encouraged basic primary educa-
tion and persuaded a number of mullahs to allow their mosques to be used
for this purpose and even initiated a teacher training programme for these
religious leaders. The Amir, impressed by the success of this programme,
allocated an additional lakh of rupees for the expansion of the project
and shortly before his arrest Dr Ghani presented Habib Allah Khan with