Diaries of Field Marshal Ayub Khan 1966-1972

Pakistan's first military ruler, Mohammad Ayub Khan, was born in 1907, in the village of Rehana, near Haripur. In 1951, he became the country's first Pakistani Commander-in-Chief, and subsequently served as defence minister in the second cabinet of Mohammad Ali Bogra. On declaration of martial law by Iskander Mirza on 7 October 1958, he was made the chief martial law administrator. Less than three weeks later, after deposing Iskander Mirza in a bloodless coup, Ayub Khan became the president of Pakistan on 27 October 1958. The present volume contains the diaries maintained by Field Marshal Ayub Khan from September 1966 to October 1972. The diaries cover a very turbulent period in Pakistan's history that included Ayub Khan's yielding of the presidency to Yahya Khan, the period of Yahya Khan's rule that saw the end of the unified state of Pakistan and the independence of Bangladesh, and finally, the replacement of Yahya Khan by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. The book offers authentic material for scholars, academics, students and the general reader interested in Pakistan's political history, and will be of special interest to those who lived through those difficult times. The diaries also shed new light on Field Marshal Mohammad Ayub Khan's views on a variety of issues directly connected with Pakistan's political, social and economic development, as well as his personal perspective on important subjects.