Air Marshal Asim Suleiman (R)
IT was a beautiful moonlit night, ideal for night flying at PAF Base Masroor, Karachi. The month was October in the year 1990. I was a Squadron Leader then and was detailed to perform Mobil duties. Mobil is a small glass cabin next to the runway to monitor flying in the immediate vicinity of the airfield to assist the taking offs/landings and airborne traffic for any procedural guidance. It is the most appropriate place to witness flying as closely as possible, as you are just a few hundred feet away from the aircraft with flashing navigation lights, full beam of landing lights and the roar of the jets with the red/violet plume oozing out of the exhaust section of aircraft during the take-offs.
As the first wave was about to take-off our Officer Commanding Flying Wing, Gp Capt Ata-ur-Rehman arrived at the Mobil accompanied by a couple who seemed to be in their seventies. The gentleman was Wg Cdr Edwin Nazirullah and the accompanying lady was his wife. The visitors quickly settled down in the Mobil to watch the activity as the aircraft started to line up for the take-off sequence. For the first wave we had eight Mirage aircraft. After the first wave took-off there was a lull in the activity. During this period Wg Cdr Edwin Nazirullah started to narrate his experiences of IAF where he got his commission as a fighter pilot. After partition he was the first Station Commander of RPAF Station Peshawar.
As nostalgia grew he took a steep dive down memory lane and started to narrate about his prominent and close colleagues that he had served with. During that conversation he mentioned Squadron Leader Habibullah Khan famously know as Bulbul Khan, who died in an air crash in April 1943. He regarded him in the highest esteem and considered him as his mentor. This mention of Sqn Ldr Habibullah gave me goose bumps. His spouse Mrs. Saeeda Habibullah was a close relative of both my parents and my father-in-law was also related to him. We all belong to the Kakazai Clan.
When I told him of my relationship with Sqn Ldr Habibullah he became excited. He then requested me to tell him about his family, his wife and the two brothers whom he remembered vaguely. I told him that Mrs. Habib and his younger brother Dr Najeeb lived in Lahore, unfortunately his elder brother had passed away in 1989. His elder brother Mohammad Inamullah Khan was an engineer by profession and had graduated from Durham University UK. Inam saheb was married to Mrs. Habib’s eldest sister. He served as the chief engineer PWD B&R of West Pakistan. Later he was appointed as the officiating head / Vice Chancellor of the West Pakistan University of Engineering and Technology in Nov 1961. A person of impeccable honesty and integrity. He was a philanthropist and spread the knowledge of the Quran and helped people understand its core till his last.
Sqn Ldr Habib’s younger brother was a doctor who specialized in medicine from UK. He too served in the Royal Armed Forces as a doctor in Indian Medical Services and rose to the rank of Colonel in the Medical Corps. He played a pivotal role in the early development and smooth transition of Dacca Medical College (DMC). After the formal establishment of the college in 1946 he served as the incharge of DMC and the professor of Medicine.
Here it is worth mentioning that his administrative qualities helped to operationalize the newly formed medical framework at East Pakistan. Today it is the premier seat of learning medicine in Bangladesh. His enormous experience in medical education led to his appointment as Principal of Liaquat Medical College, Hyderabad as well. His last assignment was at Civil Hospital Karachi as the head of a medical unit his main field of interest was diabetes. Dr Najeeb passed away in the year 2000.
Wing Commander Nazirullah was very happy to learn about the remarkable achievements of Sqn Ldr Habib’s brothers as both of them had contributed immensely for the development of their departments and institutions at the national level. He said that Sqn Ldr Habib too had a great potential like his brothers and could have contributed for Pakistan Air Force had he been alive. While I was going through the service record of Sqn Ldr Habibullah as per seniority list of RIAF / IAF Service and Gazetted records he was the senior most Muslim fighter pilot in the IAF from 12 Feb 1942 onwards till he was alive. This information only reiterates a point that destiny plays an important role in one’s life. It he was alive he could have also flourished in the Air Force.
Mrs. Habibullah died in 2003. She did not remarry after Sqn Ldr Habib’s crash. She stayed associated with the Air Force even after the partition. She was a very generous and benevolent lady and provided assistance for the family medical welfare to PAF Base Lahore. Wg Cdr Nazirullah expressed the desire to meet Mrs. Habibullah. I conveyed the same to my Auntie and she told me to invite them to Lahore and be her guests, but unfortunately they could not meet due to traveling inconvenience at old age.
During my conversation with Wg Cdr Edwin Nazirullah I asked him about his family. He told me that he does not have any children neither did he want to burden anyone with his responsibility, therefore, he had requested Air Chief to help him to provide him accommodation at any Base in Karachi area. Having been Air Chief Marshal Hakimullah aide at the AHQs, as I expected, his munificence followed. Wg Cdr Nazirullah was offered boarding and lodging at PAF Base Masroor. He was very thankful to ACM Hakimullah to honour his request. On the orders of the Air Chief he was supported in an honourable manner. Wg Cdr Nazirullah shifted to the Base Masroor where he and his wife lived happily with their pets. He passed away in 1997 and was buried in Masroor.
This was my first direct interaction with any officer of the Air Force who had closely worked with Sqn Ldr Habibullah. As an Air Force officer I was proud to hear about his heroics and calibre of his competence. Wg Cdr Nazirullah who had served with him in the IAF had a lot of respect and regard for him and he rated him very high in the professional domain as a commander and a fighter pilot. In the Part II, I shall dwell more about his career and his standing among his peers in the Air Force. —To be continued.
—The writer is President at the Centre for Aerospace and Security Studies, Lahore.