Emir Sayyid Mir Muhammad Alim Khan ( uz, Said Mir Muhammad Olimxon, 3 January 1880 – 28 April 1944) was the last
emir
Emir (; ar, أمير ' ), sometimes transliterated amir, amier, or ameer, is a word of Arabic origin that can refer to a male monarch, aristocrat, holder of high-ranking military or political office, or other person possessing actual or cer ...
of the Uzbek
Manghit dynasty, rulers of the
Emirate of Bukhara
The Emirate of Bukhara ( fa, , Amārat-e Bokhārā, chg, , Bukhārā Amirligi) was a Muslims, Muslim polity in Central Asia that existed from 1785 to 1920 in what is modern-day Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. It occupied ...
in
Central Asia
Central Asia, also known as Middle Asia, is a region of Asia that stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to western China and Mongolia in the east, and from Afghanistan and Iran in the south to Russia in the north. It includes the former ...
. Although Bukhara was a
protectorate
A protectorate, in the context of international relations, is a state that is under protection by another state for defence against aggression and other violations of law. It is a dependent territory that enjoys autonomy over most of its inte ...
of the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the List of Russian monarchs, Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended th ...
from 1873, the Emir presided over the internal affairs of his
emirate
An emirate is a territory ruled by an emir, a title used by monarchs or high officeholders in the Muslim world. From a historical point of view, an emirate is a political-religious unit smaller than a caliphate. It can be considered equiva ...
as
absolute monarch
Absolute monarchy (or Absolutism as a doctrine) is a form of monarchy in which the monarch rules in their own right or power. In an absolute monarchy, the king or queen is by no means limited and has absolute power, though a limited constitut ...
and reigned from 3 January 1911 to 30 August 1920.
Early life
At the age of thirteen, Alim Khan was sent by his father Emir
Abdulahad Khan to
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
for three years to study government and modern military techniques. In 1896, having received formal confirmation as
Crown Prince
A crown prince or hereditary prince is the heir apparent to the throne in a royal or imperial monarchy. The female form of the title is crown princess, which may refer either to an heiress apparent or, especially in earlier times, to the wife ...
of Bukhara by the Russian government, he returned home.
After two years in Bukhara assisting in his father's administration, he was appointed governor of Nasef region for the next twelve years. He was then transferred to the northern province of
Karmana, which he ruled for another two years, until receiving word in 1910 of his father's death.
Reign
Alim Khan's rule began with promise. Initially, he declared that he would no longer expect or accept any gifts, and prohibited his officials from demanding
bribes
Bribery is the offering, giving, receiving, or soliciting of any item of value to influence the actions of an official, or other person, in charge of a public or legal duty. With regard to governmental operations, essentially, bribery is "Corr ...
from the public, or imposing
taxes on their own authority. However, as time went by the Emir's attitude towards bribes, taxes, and state salaries changed. The conflict between the traditionalists and the reformists ended with the traditionalists in control, and the reformers in exile in
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...
or
Kazan
Kazan ( ; rus, Казань, p=kɐˈzanʲ; tt-Cyrl, Казан, ''Qazan'', IPA: ɑzan is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Tatarstan in Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Volga and the Kazanka rivers, covering ...
. It is thought that Alim Khan, who initially favored
modernization
Modernization theory is used to explain the process of modernization within societies. The "classical" theories of modernization of the 1950s and 1960s drew on sociological analyses of Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim and a partial reading of Max Weber, ...
and the reformists, realised that their eventual goals included no place for either him or his descendants as rulers. Like his predecessors, Alim Khan was a traditional ruler. He toyed with the idea of reform as a tool to keep the clergy in line, and only as long as he saw the possibility of using it to strengthen Manghud rule.
One of the most important
Tajik
Tajik, Tadjik, Tadzhik or Tajikistani may refer to:
* Someone or something related to Tajikistan
* Tajiks, an ethnic group in Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan
* Tajik language, the official language of Tajikistan
* Tajik (surname)
* Tajik cu ...
writers,
Sadriddin Ayniy, wrote vivid accounts of life under the Emir. He was whipped for speaking
Tajik
Tajik, Tadjik, Tadzhik or Tajikistani may refer to:
* Someone or something related to Tajikistan
* Tajiks, an ethnic group in Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan
* Tajik language, the official language of Tajikistan
* Tajik (surname)
* Tajik cu ...
and later wrote about the life under the Emirs in the ''Bukhara Executioners'' ("Jallodon-i Bukhara").
Alim Khan was the only Manghud ruler to add the title of
Caliph
A caliphate or khilāfah ( ar, خِلَافَة, ) is an institution or public office under the leadership of an Islamic steward with the title of caliph (; ar, خَلِيفَة , ), a person considered a political-religious successor to th ...
to his name, and was the last direct descendant of the
Manghit dynasty to serve as a national ruler.
In March 1918 activists of the Young Bukharan Movement (
Yosh Buxoroliklar
The Young Bukharans ( fa, جوانبخارائیان; uz, Yosh buxoroliklar) or Mladobukharans were a secret society founded in Bukhara in 1909, which was part of the jadidist movement seeking to reform and modernize Central Asia along Wester ...
) informed the
Bolsheviks
The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
that the Bukharians were ready for the revolution and that the people were awaiting liberation. The Red Army marched to the gates of Bukhara and demanded that the emir surrender the city to the Young Bukharans. As Russian sources report, the emir responded by killing the Bolshevik delegation, along with several hundred Russian supporters of the Bolsheviks in Bukhara and the surrounding territories. The majority of Bukharans did not support an invasion and the ill-equipped and ill-disciplined Bolshevik army fled back to the Soviet stronghold at
Tashkent
Tashkent (, uz, Toshkent, Тошкент/, ) (from russian: Ташкент), or Toshkent (; ), also historically known as Chach is the capital and largest city of Uzbekistan. It is the most populous city in Central Asia, with a population of ...
.
Deposition and death
However, the emir had won only a temporary respite. As the civil war in Russia wound down, Moscow sent reinforcements to Central Asia. On 2 September 1920, an army of well-disciplined and well-equipped
Red Army
The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian language, Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist R ...
troops under the command of Bolshevik general
Mikhail Frunze
Mikhail Vasilyevich Frunze (russian: Михаил Васильевич Фрунзе; ro, Mihail Frunză; 2 February 1885 – 31 October 1925) was a Bolshevik leader during and just prior to the Russian Revolution of 1917. Born in the modern-da ...
attacked the city. After four days of fighting, the
Ark of Bukhara was destroyed, the red flag was raised from the top of
Kalyan Minaret, and the Emir Alim Khan was forced to flee to his base at
Dushanbe
Dushanbe ( tg, Душанбе, ; ; russian: Душанбе) is the capital and largest city of Tajikistan. , Dushanbe had a population of 863,400 and that population was largely Tajik. Until 1929, the city was known in Russian as Dyushambe (ru ...
(in present-day
Tajikistan
Tajikistan (, ; tg, Тоҷикистон, Tojikiston; russian: Таджикистан, Tadzhikistan), officially the Republic of Tajikistan ( tg, Ҷумҳурии Тоҷикистон, Jumhurii Tojikiston), is a landlocked country in Centr ...
), and finally to
Kabul
Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Ac ...
,
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bord ...
, where he died in 1944. He is buried at the Shuadoi Solehin cemetery.
He was awarded
Order of Prince Danilo I and a number of decorations.
Family
Although the emir had several children, the exact number of offspring the emir had is unknown. Emir Alim Khan had three official wives in Bukhara but after settling in Afghanistan, people there sympathized with him and many gave their daughters to him as wives. Therefore, he had several more wives in Afghanistan.
Seyid Alim Khan had numerous offspring, which according to some estimates is about 500 people. During the last years of the Emir's life, almost all of his descendants were with him, with the exception of a few people. Due to the fact that by the end of August 1920 the Red Army was rapidly surrounding and began to bombard and storm Bukhara, Seyid Alim Khan hastily began to evacuate himself, his family and some of his close associates. However, possibly due to the suddenness of the forced evacuation, his three young sons—about 8–10 years old (according to other sources, 4–6 years old), Sultanmurad, Shahmurad and Rakhimkhan—remained in Bukhara. After the capture of Bukhara, the Bolsheviks discovered them and at first wanted to shoot them together with the remaining several members of the family and close associates of the emir (similar to the execution of Nicholas II with his family and close associates), but left them alive in order to further propaganda in their favor, sending all three to Moscow, to be raised in an orphanage for orphans of dead Bolsheviks and soldiers of the Red Army.
Seyid Alim Khan appealed to the Bolsheviks and the world community to let his children and other family members who remained in Bukhara be released to join him in Afghanistan. But the Bolsheviks refused him and in fact kept them as a hostage for personal political and ideological purposes. The eldest of the three sons of Seyid Alim Khan remaining in the USSR, Sultanmurad, was disabled and lame from birth. He graduated from the Faculty of Workers and after his studies began working at a factory for the disabled. According to some reports, he spoke English. Some time later, Sultanmurad was arrested by the NKVD and declared an " enemy of the people ". Among other charges, he was accused of collaborating with British intelligence. After his arrest, Sultanmurad announced a
hunger strike
A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke a feeling of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most ...
and soon died, most likely from exhaustion. Sultanmurad was married. His wife at that time worked at a soap factory and, according to some reports, upon learning of the death of her husband, she threw herself into a cauldron of boiling soap.
Before the outbreak of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
, during the "
Great Terror", the youngest of the remaining sons of Seyid Alim Khan, Rakhimkhan, who remained in the USSR, tried to flee the country, but he was detained by Soviet border guards right on the Soviet-Afghan border. According to some sources, he was detained on the territory of the Uzbek SSR, right on the Amu Darya River, which separated the USSR and Afghanistan; according to other sources, he was detained on the territory of the Turkmen SSR, where the border between the USSR and Afghanistan runs through the steppes and hills. After that, a sentence of execution was read to him, and he was shot by the NKVD.
The middle of the three, Shakhmurad, was also with his brothers in a Moscow orphanage, but in 1922, together with several Bukhara youths, he was sent by the authorities of the Bukhara People's Soviet Republic to study in Germany as part of the training of new young personnel for the young republic. Due to ideological considerations, he was given a new full name - "Alimov Shah Muratovich" (according to other sources, his full name was "Shakhmurad Alimkhanov"). After returning from studies, he was fluent in German. He also studied at the Institute of the coal industry. According to Shakhmurad's classmate, Khaidar Yusupov, Shakhmurad dreamed of becoming a military man, but he could not be admitted to study at a military school due to ideological considerations, since he was "the son of an enemy of the people." After that, on the advice of friends and acquaintances, he decided to disown his father. In 1930 (according to other sources, in 1929) he wrote an open letter to his father through the Izvestia newspaper, where he renounced Seyid Alim Khan, accusing him and his government of grave sins and deeds. According to some reports, this was arranged by the NKVD, which pushed him to take such a step through acquaintances and friends who were informers of this special service. After that, he was admitted in the Moscow Military Engineering Academy named after V. V. Kuibyshev. After graduation, he began teaching at the same academy. He served in the Red Army and later received the rank of major general. He participated in the Great Patriotic War (World War II) and lost his leg, was awarded the Order of the Red Banner, and after the end of the war he again began teaching at the V. V. Kuibyshev Military Engineering Academy in Moscow. He was married, his wife's name was Lidia Mikhailovna. According to the memoirs of one of Shakhmurad's contemporaries, "When Shakhmurad came to visit us with his wife Lidia Mikhailovna, then, having drunk, he remembered his parents and cried." Many of Shahmurad's acquaintances and friends did not know about his origin, and he spoke about his past only to close friends. According to some reports, he died in 1985 in Moscow, at the age of 75.
Alim Khan's daughter, Shukria Alimi Raad, worked as a broadcaster for
Radio Afghanistan. Shukria Raad left Afghanistan with her family three months after
Soviet troops invaded the country in December 1979. With her husband, also a journalist, and two children she fled to
Pakistan
Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
, and then through
Germany
Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG),, is a country in Central Europe. It is the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany lies between the Baltic and North Sea to the north and the Alps to the sou ...
to the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...
. In 1982 she joined the
Voice of America
Voice of America (VOA or VoA) is the state-owned news network and international radio broadcaster of the United States of America. It is the largest and oldest U.S.-funded international broadcaster. VOA produces digital, TV, and radio content ...
, working for many years as a broadcaster for VOA's
Dari
Dari (, , ), also known as Dari Persian (, ), is the variety of the Persian language spoken in Afghanistan. Dari is the term officially recognised and promoted since 1964 by the Afghan government for the Persian language,Lazard, G.Darī  ...
Service, editor, program host and producer.
During his governance in Bukhara, Alim Khan also had a son named Qasem who was killed by the Bolshevik revolutionaries. Qasem had only one son who, when he was 13 years old, escaped from Bukhara to
Mashad
Mashhad ( fa, مشهد, Mašhad ), also spelled Mashad, is the second-most-populous city in Iran, located in the relatively remote north-east of the country about from Tehran. It serves as the capital of Razavi Khorasan Province and has a po ...
, Iran with his stepfather. When he arrived in Iran, he took the name Husein Bukharaei. He married Bibimeymanat Mohsenolhoseini in Mashhad. They had 6 sons and 4 daughters. Husein Bukharaei died in 1993. Their children (Hasan, Lo'ba, Ali, Narges, Qasem, Reza, Fatemeh, Mohammad, Mahmoud, Mahboubeh) all live in Mashhad.
In 2020, the BBC World Service made a documentary called ''Bukhara'' about the last ruler of Bukhara, which refers to the fate of the family of Amir Alam Khan.
Alim Khan's descendants include granddaughter Nailaj Naebzadeh from his daughter Razia Alimi, and great-granddaughter Kadeij Naebzadeh.
They live in United States. Nailaj Naebzadeh was born in United States. Just like her aunt, Shukria Alimi Raad, her mother Razia Alimi also escaped from Afghanistan during the invasion of the Soviet Army in 1979.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mohammed Alim Khan
1880 births
1944 deaths
Emirs of Bukhara
Uzbeks
Russian anti-communists
Borjigin
Recipients of the Order of Saint Stanislaus (Russian), 1st class
Recipients of the Order of St. Vladimir, 2nd class
Recipients of the Order of St. Anna, 1st class
Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Russia)