Saidullah

Saidullah (also known as "Mullah Mastun" [Spain. 177] [Easwaran p. 49] lewanai faqir or lewanai in Pashto [Beattie p. 171] and by the British as "The Great Fakir" or "Mad Fakir" [Hobday p. 13] , "Mad Fakir of Swat" [Edwards p. 177] or the "Mad Mullah", [Elliott-Lockhart p. 28] ) was a Pashtun fakir and religious mendicant whose Pashto name translated to "God-intoxicated" as a reference to his religious convictions and his belief that he was capable of miraculous powers. [Beattie p. 171] In response to the British occupation of the North West Frontier Province of modern day Pakistan, and the division of Pashtun lands by the 1,519 mile long Durand Line, [Lamb p. 93] Saidullah declared a jihad against the occupying British Empire and led from 10,000 to 100,000 [Wilkinson-Latham p. 20] [Gore p. 405] [Easwaran p. 49] Pashtun tribesmen in an uprising which began with the siege of Malakand from July 26 to August 2 1897 against British forces under Brigadier-General William Hope Meiklejohn, and Major-General Sir Bindon Blood.

Notes

References

* Beattie, Hugh "Imperial Frontier: Tribe and State in Waziristan", 2002 ISBN 0700713093
* Easwaran, Eknath "Nonviolent Soldier of Islam: Badshah Khan, a Man to Match His Mountains", 1999 ISBN 1888314001
* Elliott-Lockhart, Percy C. and Dunmore, Edward M. Earl of Alexander "A Frontier Campaign: A Narrative of the Operations of the Malakand and Buner Field Forces, 1897-1898", 1898
* Edwards, David B. "Heroes of the age: Moral Fault Lines on the Afghan Frontier" ISBN 0520200640
* Gore, Surgeon General at Nowshera, for "The Dublin Journal of Medical Science", 1898
* Hobday, Edmund A. P. "Sketches on Service During the Indian Frontier Campaigns of 1897", 1898
* Spain, James William "The Pathan Borderland", 1963 ASIN B0000CR0HH
* Wilkinson-Latham, Robert "North-west Frontier 1837-1947", 1977 ISBN 0850452759