dreams melted into air, 1919–29Mustafa Kemal declared Islam was better off if it ‘ceased to be a political
instrument’. The disestablishment of Islam and Islamic institutions appalled
Afghanistan’s religious establishment, who were convinced that the king,
egged on by Queen Soraya, Mahmud Tarzi and the Turcophile Young
Afghans, planned a similar fate for Afghanistan.
Despite opposition to the Nizam Namas, ’Aman Allah Khan pushed
on regardless and in the autumn of 1923 he held a jirga in Jalalabad in an
attempt to gain support and legitimacy for his Constitution, only for reli-
gious and tribal leaders to condemn many of its provisions. The brother of
the influential Hazrat of Chaharbagh rejected many of the Nizam Namas
on the grounds that they did not conform to either Islamic law or Pushtun
customary law and declared his opposition to compulsory, universal
primary education, which he claimed undermined the madrasa system.
Tribal leaders then complained about reductions in their state allowances,
conscription, tax hikes and the new marriage laws. There were protests too
in Laghman, Kandahar and Helmand, and one army battalion mutinied.
When a delegation of mullahs from Jabal Saraj went to Kabul to complain
about the presence of foreign teachers in their schools they were arrested,
though they were later released following the intervention of Akhundzada
Hamid Allah, the Mullah of Tagab.
While the debate over the Constitution raged, the king’s relations with
Britain were further strained due to cross-border activities by bandits. In
April 1923 a group of Shinwaris from the Afghan side of the frontier killed
two British officers in Landi Kotal, while Afridi outlaws in Kohat murdered
Mrs Ellis, the wife of a British major, and abducted her seventeen-year-
old daughter Molly. When the Shinwaris fled into Afghanistan, Britain
demanded the king punish them or hand them over to British justice. After
a delay of several weeks, the king finally arrested the Shinwaris, only for
them to conveniently escape before their trial. The king’s actions angered
tribal and religious leaders, since they regarded the arrests as a violation of
nanawatai as well as abject surrender to the old enemy. The Hajji Sahib of
Turangzai and the Mullah of Chaknawaz, two highly influential pirs, then
extended their personal protection to the Shinwari fugitives, whereupon
Britain demanded the king re-arrest the assassins and blocked all arms
shipments to Afghanistan in order to put pressure on the king. In the end
’Aman Allah Khan sent police to take the Shinwaris by force and in the
clash that followed, one policeman and one of the bandits were shot dead.
The Afridi kidnappers meanwhile took refuge deep in Tirah’s tribal
territory. Lilian Starr, Matron of the Church Missionary Society Hospital in
Peshawar, whose husband had been stabbed to death in his bed a few years