Rashid Minhas (Urdu: راشد منہاس‎ NH) was a Pakistani pilot in the Pakistan Air Force. Minhas was the only PAF officer to receive the highest valour award, the Nishan-e-Haider. He was also the youngest person and the shortest-serving officer to have received this award. During the routine training mission in August 1971, Minhas attempted to gain control of his jet trainer when his superior officer Flight Lieutenant Matiur Rahman hijacked his plane and was trying to defect to India to join the Liberation war of Bangladesh which then crashed near the Thatta District, Sindh in Pakistan.Rashid Minhas was born on 17 February 1951, in Karachi to a Muslim Rajput family[2][3][4] of the Minhas clan. Rashid Minhas spent his early childhood in Karachi. Later, the family shifted to Rawalpindi. Later his family shifted back to Karachi. Minhas was fascinated with aviation history and technology. He used to collect different models of aircraft and jets. He also attended St Patrick's High School, Karachi.[5] The ancestors of Rashid Minhas were born in Qila Sobha Singh and later on they moved to Karachi and Rashid Minhas was born in Karachi. His father, Majeed Minhas, a civil engineer and an alumnus of the NED University in Karachi, was in a construction management business who later moved to Lahore, Punjab, for the construction project.[6] He was educated in Lahore and took admission in the British-managed St. Mary's School in Rawalpindi when his father found an employment opportunity. But later they permanently settled in Karachi.[6] He passed and qualified for his Senior Cambridge examination and performed well while finishing the O-level and A-level qualifications from the St. Patrick's High School.[5]: 181 [7] His father, Majeed Minhas, wanted his son, Rashid, to follow his step by attending the engineering university and strongly desired for his son to gain a degree in engineering after finishing his high schooling in Karachi.: 182 [7] Against the wishes of his father, Rashid entered in the PAF School in Lower Topa in 1968, the Air Force's officer candidate school, and forwarded towards completing his military training at the Pakistan Air Force Academy in 1969.: 182 [7] Having joined the air force, Minhas was commissioned on 13 March 1971, in the 51st GD(P) Course.[8] He began training to become a pilot. On 20 August of that year, in the hour before noon, he was getting ready to take off in a T-33 jet trainer in Karachi, Pakistan. His second solo flight in that type of aircraft. Minhas was taxiing toward the runway when a Bengali instructor pilot, Flight Lieutenant Matiur Rahman, signalled him to stop and then climbed into the instructor's seat. The jet took off and Rahman turned towards India. Minhas radioed PAF Base Masroor with the message that he was being hijacked. The air controller requested that he resend his message and he confirmed the hijacking. Later investigation showed that Rahman intended to defect to India to join his compatriots in the Bangladesh Liberation War, along with the jet trainer. In the air, Minhas struggled physically to wrest control from Rahman; both men tried to overpower the other through the mechanically linked flight controls. Some 32 miles (51 km) from the Indian border, the jet crashed near Thatta. Both men were killed.[9] Minhas was posthumously awarded Pakistan's top military honour, the Nishan-e-Haider, and became the youngest man and the only member of the Pakistan Air Force to win the award. Similarly, Rahman was honoured by Bangladesh with their highest military award, the Bir Sreshtho.[10] Minhas's Pakistan military citation for the Nishan-e-Haider states that he "forced the aircraft to crash" to prevent Rahman from taking the jet to India.[9] This is the official, popular and widely known version of how Minhas died. Yawar A. Mazhar, a writer for Pakistan Military Consortium, relayed in 2004 that he spoke to retired PAF Group Captain Cecil Chaudhry about Minhas and that he learned more details not generally known to the public. According to Mazhar, Chaudhry led the immediate task of investigating the wreckage and writing the accident report. Chaudhry told Mazhar that he found the jet had hit the ground nose first, instantly killing Minhas in the front seat. Rahman's body, however, was not in the jet and the canopy was missing. Chaudhry searched the area and saw Rahman's body some distance behind the jet, the body found with severe abrasions from hitting the sand at a low angle and a high speed. Chaudhry thought that Minhas probably jettisoned the canopy at low altitude causing Rahman to be thrown from the cockpit because he was not strapped in. Chaudhry felt that the jet was too close to the ground at that time, too far out of control for Minhas to be able to prevent the crash.After his death, Minhas was honoured as a national hero. In his memory, the Pakistan Air Force base at Kamra was renamed PAF Base Minhas, often called Minhas-Kamra. In Karachi he was honoured by the naming of a main road, 'Rashid Minhas Road'[12][13] (Urdu: شاہراہ راشد منہاس‎). A two-rupee postage stamp bearing his image was issued by Pakistan Post in December 2003; 500,000 were printed.

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Major Tufail Mohammad

Tufail Mohammad was born in Hoshiarpur, Punjab in India into a Punjabi family on 22 June 1914 according to his gravestone markings.: 45 [4] His family was of Gujjar descent [5] – and was educated at the D.A.V. College in Jalandhar.[1] In 1932, he enlisted in the Indian Army and was trained at the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun in 1941, gaining commission in the Indian Army into the 1st Battalion of the 16th Punjab Regiment (1/16th) of the Indian Army in 1943.: 45 [4] Attached to the Punjab Regiment, he served on the training assignments to the Punjab Regiment of the Indian Army and later serving on the administrative positions on the Punjab Regiment of the Pakistan Army in 1947–58.[1] From 1947–54, he was later deputed by the federal government to the provincial governments to serve as an advisor and trainer to the law enforcement agencies before permanently dispatched to the East Pakistan Rifles in 1954.[6] His career in the military mostly served with the East Pakistan Rifles where he served as the commanding officer of the military company near the Indo-East Pakistani border.[3] In 1957, the Indian Army troops crossed into the Indo-East Pakistani border, and occupied the Laxmipur District in East-Pakistan.[7] Responding to the infiltration, Major Tufail was ordered to formed three quick response teams to launch an attack on three sides on the resting Indian Army battalion.[7] On 7 August 1958, Major Tufail made a slow quadrupedal movement towards the Indian Army posts and engaged in a firefight with the enemy forces as close as 15 yards in an attempt to make them withdraw from their positions.[6] Leading attack team from the backside of the post while other two teams engaged the enemy from front and right sides,[6] Major Tufail was the first casualty that sustained the injury from the upcoming fire inside the bunker, and threw a grenade at the near post, that killed the enemy machine gunners.[6] Inside the bunker, the mortally wounded Major Tufail had to engage in a close quarters battle with the Indian Army soldiers, eventually taking out the machine gunners that were targeting the Pakistan Army soldiers on the front side by throwing grenades and engaging with machine guns.[6] His actions of valor reportedly saved many Pakistan Army soldiers when he led the attacking team from the backside of the battalion bunker as the Indian Army soldiers were driven out retreated to their original positions, leaving four dead and three of their personnel behind, who were taken as the war prisoners.: 26 [2] Despite receiving immediate medical attention, Major Tufail himself succumbed to his wounds and quoted his last word to his junior officer: "I have completed my duty; the enemy is on the run."[7]: 26 [2] On 7 August 1958, Major Tufail was succumbed to his wounds– he was 43–44 years old at the time of his death.: 26 [2] Major Tufail was buried in Burewala, Punjab in Pakistan, and the federal government later built a marble tomb in 1967.: 38 [8] In 1993, he was subjected a biographical war telefilm, "Major Tufail Mohammad Shaheed" produced and directed by the Qasim Jilali of the PTV.[9] In 1967, he was posthumously awarded the Nishan-e-Haider by the President of Pakistan, becoming the second officer to receive the award.: 38 [8]: 26 [2] The Presidential Nishan-e-Haider citation on his grave is written in Urdu; and its reads with translation as: Citation: After the establishment of Pakistan, Tufail Muhammad served with distinction in the 13th Punjab, leading to promotion to Major. In 1958, the Maj. Tufail was affiliated with the East Pakistan Rifles and was trusted as the commanding officer of the quick response teams of the close quarters combat to liberate the Lakshmipur District by undertaking the difficult mission. Success of these efforts came....with the display of the tremendous courage despite being mortally wounded while being under fire. The "Green and White Flag with the Star and Crescent" was hoisted by the troops at the Lakshmipur District in East-Pakistan. On 7 August 1958, Maj. Tufail sacrifice his life to save his insubordinate troops and is posthumously presented with the Nishan-e-Haider.[10]

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Laiket Ali Khan

Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan (Navābzādā Liāqat Alī Khān About this soundlisten (help·info), Urdu: لِیاقت علی خان‎ ; October 1895 – 16 October 1951), widely known as Quaid-e-Millat (Leader of the Nation) and Shaheed-e-Millat (Urdu: شہِیدِ مِلّت‎ Martyr of the Nation), was a Pakistani statesman, lawyer, political theorist, and one of the leading founding fathers of Pakistan. He became the first prime minister of Pakistan; he also held cabinet portfolio as the first foreign, defence, and the frontier regions minister from 1947 until his assassination in 1951. Prior to the partition, Khan briefly tenured as the first finance minister in the interim government led by Governor General Mountbatten. Liaquat Ali Khan was born in Uttar Pradesh in what was then British India in October 1895.[1] He was educated at Aligarh Muslim University in India, and then at Oxford University.[citation needed] Well-educated, he was a democratic political theorist who promoted parliamentarism in India. After first being invited by the Congress Party, he opted for the Muslim League led by influential Muhammad Ali Jinnah who was advocating the eradication of the injustices and ill-treatment meted out to Indian Muslims by the British government. He pursued his role in the independence movements of India and Pakistan, while serving as the first Finance Minister in the interim government of British Indian Empire, prior to the independence and partition of India in 1947.[citation needed] Ali Khan assisted Jinnah in campaigning for the creation of a separate state for Indian Muslims. Ali Khan's credentials secured him the appointment of Pakistan's first Prime Minister, Ali Khan's foreign policy sided with the United States and the West, though his foreign policy was determined to be a part of the Non Aligned Movement. Facing internal political unrest, his government survived an attempted coup by nationalists, socialists and Communists spearheaded by segments of the army. Nonetheless, his influence grew further after Jinnah's death, and he was responsible for promulgating the Objectives Resolution. In 1951, at a political rally in Rawalpindi, Ali Khan was assassinated by a hired assassin, Said Akbar.

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Allama Iqbal 1947

Sir Muhammad Iqbal Kt (Urdu: محمد اقبال‎; 9 November 1877 – 21 April 1938), was a South Asian Muslim writer,[1][2] philosopher,[3] and politician,[4] whose poetry in the Urdu language is among the greatest of the twentieth century,[5][6][7][8] and whose vision of a cultural and political ideal for the Muslims of British-ruled India[9] was to animate the impulse for Pakistan.[1][10] He is commonly referred to by the honorific Allama[11] (from Persian: علامہ‎, romanized: ʿallāma, lit. 'very knowing, most learned').[12] Born and raised in Sialkot, Punjab in an ethnic Kashmiri Muslim family, Iqbal completed his B.A. and M.A. at the Government College Lahore. He taught Arabic at the Oriental College, Lahore from 1899 until 1903. During this time, he wrote prolifically. Among the Urdu poems from this time that remain popular are Parinde ki faryad (A bird's prayer), an early meditation on animal rights, and Tarana-e-Hindi (The Song of India) a patriotic poem—both poems composed for children. In 1905, he left for further studies in Europe, first to England, where he completed a second B.A. at Trinity College, Cambridge and was subsequently called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn, and then to Germany, where he received a Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Munich. After returning to Lahore in 1908, he established a law practice but concentrated on writing scholarly works on politics, economics, history, philosophy, and religion. He is best known for his poetic works, including Asrar-e-Khudi – after whose publication he was awarded a knighthood,[13] Rumuz-e-Bekhudi, and the Bang-e-Dara. In Iran, where he is known as Iqbāl-e Lāhorī (Iqbal of Lahore), he is highly regarded for his Persian works. Iqbal was a strong proponent of the political and spiritual revival of Islamic civilisation across the world, but in particular in South Asia; a series of lectures he delivered to this effect were published as The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam. Iqbal was elected to the Punjab Legislative Council in 1927 and held a number of positions in the All India Muslim League. In his 1930 presidential address at the League's annual meeting in Allahabad, he formulated a political framework for Muslims in British-ruled India.[9] Iqbal died in 1938. After the creation of Pakistan in 1947, he was named the national poet there. He is also known as the "Hakeem-ul-Ummat" (“The Sage of the Ummah”) and the "Mufakkir-e-Pakistan" (“The Thinker of Pakistan”). The anniversary of his birth (Yom-e Welādat-e Muḥammad Iqbāl), 9 November, used to be a public holiday in Pakistan until 2018.[14]

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Quaid-e-Azam 1947

Muhammad Ali Jinnah (born Mahomedali Jinnahbhai; 25 December 1876 – 11 September 1948) was a barrister, politician and the founder of Pakistan.[1] Jinnah served as the leader of the All-India Muslim League from 1913 until the inception of Pakistan on 14 August 1947, and then as the Dominion of Pakistan's first governor-general until his death. He is revered in Pakistan as the Quaid-i-Azam ("Great Leader") and Baba-i-Qaum ("Father of the Nation"). His birthday is observed as a national holiday in Pakistan. Born at Wazir Mansion in Karachi, Jinnah was trained as a barrister at Lincoln's Inn in London, England. Upon his return to British India, he enrolled at the Bombay High Court, and took an interest in national politics, which eventually replaced his legal practice. Jinnah rose to prominence in the Indian National Congress in the first two decades of the 20th century. In these early years of his political career, Jinnah advocated Hindu–Muslim unity, helping to shape the 1916 Lucknow Pact between the Congress and the All-India Muslim League, in which Jinnah had also become prominent. Jinnah became a key leader in the All-India Home Rule League, and proposed a fourteen-point constitutional reform plan to safeguard the political rights of Muslims in the Indian subcontinent. In 1920, however, Jinnah resigned from the Congress when it agreed to follow a campaign of satyagraha, which he regarded as political anarchy. By 1940, Jinnah had come to believe that the Muslims of the subcontinent should have their own state to avoid the possible marginalised status they may gain in an independent Hindu–Muslim state. In that year, the Muslim League, led by Jinnah, passed the Lahore Resolution, demanding a separate nation for British Indian Muslims. During the Second World War, the League gained strength while leaders of the Congress were imprisoned, and in the provincial elections held shortly after the war, it won most of the seats reserved for Muslims. Ultimately, the Congress and the Muslim League could not reach a power-sharing formula that would allow the entirety of British India to be united as a single state following independence, leading all parties to agree instead to the independence of a predominantly Hindu India, and for a Muslim-majority state of Pakistan. As the first Governor-General of Pakistan, Jinnah worked to establish the new nation's government and policies, and to aid the millions of Muslim migrants who had emigrated from neighbouring India to Pakistan after the two states' independence, personally supervising the establishment of refugee camps. Jinnah died at age 71 in September 1948, just over a year after Pakistan gained independence from the United Kingdom. He left a deep and respected legacy in Pakistan. Innumerable streets, roads and localities in the world are named after Jinnah. Several universities and public buildings in Pakistan bear Jinnah's name. According to his biographer, Stanley Wolpert, Jinnah remains Pakistan's greatest leader.

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