¹ The first political party, Jamiat-e Serri-ye Melli (National Secret Association) was suppressed in 1909 and its leaders were executed or imprisoned. The exact date of its foundation is unknown, as it was an underground party, though the date was 1906. See Ghubar, M.G., Afghanistan dar Masir-e Tarikh, Jeld-e Awal (Kabul, 1967), 717–20Google Scholar; Habibi, A., Junbesh-e Mashrotyat dar Afghanistan (Kabul, 1984)Google Scholar; Gregorian, Vartan, The Emergence of Modern Afghanistan: Politics of Reform and Modernization, 1880–1946 (Stanford, CA, 1969), 7.Google Scholar

² Muhammad Daud, the then minister of defence, was the main supporter and advocate of the party. Perhaps this idea helped him later to found Hezbe Enqelab-e Melli (National Revolution Party) during his presidency in 1975.

³ In name, the president of the party was Sayyid Shamsoddin Majrooh, and its secretary was Dr Abdul Qayum. See Ghubar, G.M., Afghanistan dar Masir-e Tarikh, Jeld-e Dovom (Virginia, 1999), 243.Google Scholar However, the real founders were Muhammad Daud and Abdul Majid Zabuli. Boyko, Vladimir, “The Origin of Political Parties in Contemporary Afghanistan in the Light of New Archival Data,” Central Asia Journal 46 (2000): 201.Google Scholar

⁴ According to Amin, four ideologically oriented groups flourished during the Constitutional Decade: (1) The conservatives, made up of the ruling elite, religious elements, and the business elite, who were mainly interested in maintaining the status quo; (2) the liberals or social democrats, consisting of the westernized upper class and some sections of the middle class, who favored a reformist approach and a mixed economy; (3) leftists, mainly drawn from the educated middle class … who worked for a socialist revolution; (4) the fundamentalist groups, made up of some sections of the educated middle and lower classes, who worked for an Islamic revival.

Amin, Tahir, “Afghan Resistance. Past, Present and Future,” Asian Survey 24 (1984): 376.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁵ While the role of the political parties in organizing students' strike is well known, they, especially the left, also had a tremendous part in organizing workers' demonstrations, which had no precedent in Afghanistan. For example, in the Gulbahar textile mill a worker demonstration in June 1968, which lasted for many days, involved more than 12,000 people. Burdett, A.L.P., ed., Afghanistan Strategic Intelligence British Records 1919–1970,(London, 2002), IV: 885.Google Scholar

⁶ Among the political parties, Sazman-e Jawanan-e Motaraqi (Progressive Youth Organization), a Maoist group, did not believe in parliamentary democracy. It advocated revolution.

⁷ Safa, Akhwan, Tarikh-i Shefahi-ye Afghanistan, 1900-1992 (Tehran, 2004), 93Google Scholar; Farahi, Ghafar, De Demokrasi aw Jamhuryat pa Kalono ke 1963–1978 (Peshawar, 2001), 161Google Scholar; Magnus, Ralf, “The Constitution of 1964: A Decade of Political Experimentation,” in Afghanistan in the 1970s, ed. Dupree, Louis and Albert, Linette (New York, 1974), 61.Google Scholar

⁸ Magnus notes that it was felt that the Political Parties' Bill was too important to be left to the decision of the interim government. Ibid., 61.

⁹ Tannin, Zahir, Afghanistan dar Qarn-e Bistum, 1900–1996, 2nd ed. (Tehran, 2005), 156.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Dupree, Louis, “Red Flag Over Hindu Kush: Leftist Movements in Afghanistan,” AUFS Reports Services: Asia 44 (1979): 5.Google Scholar

¹¹ Smith, Harvey, Area Handbook for Afghanistan, 4th ed. (Washington, DC, 1973), xviii.Google Scholar

¹² Weinbaum, Marvin, “Afghanistan: Nonparty Parliamentary Democracy,” The Journal of Developing Areas 7 (1972): 70.Google Scholar

¹³ Interestingly, even Afghan Sosyal Demokrat, known as Afghan Mellat, which advocated a greater Afghanistan and the domination of Pashtu over all other languages, originally had a considerable number of non-Pashtun members. Most people at the time believed it was a social democrat and nationalist party rather than one following ethnic nationalism.

¹⁴ Dupree, Louis, “A New Decade of Daud,” AUFS Reports Services: South Asia Series 17 (1973): 2.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Kakar, Hassan, Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1979–1982 (Berkeley, CA, 1995), 54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁶ Emadi, Hafizullah, “Radical Political Movements in Afghanistan and Their Politics of Peoples' Empowerment and Liberation,” Central Asian Survey 20 (2001): 428.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁷ For example, on 13 May 1968, the editor of Sho'leh-ye Jawid wrote: “Parcham [a faction of PDPA] is full of false propaganda and burning to its throat in a muddy mire of revisionism.” Louis Dupree, Afghanistan (Princeton, NJ, 1973), 615–16.

¹⁸ Dept of State, Embassy Kabul, “Bilateral Conversation with Afghan Prime Minister, January 7, 1970,” January 16, 1970.

¹⁹ Farahi, De Demokrasi aw Jamhuryat pa Kalono ke, 162.

²⁰ Roberts, Jeffery, The Origins of Conflict in Afghanistan (Westport, CT, 2003), 210.Google Scholar

²¹ Saikal, Amin, Modern Afghanistan: A History of Struggle and Survival, with assistance from Farhadi, R. and Nourzhanov, K. (London, 2004), 155.Google Scholar

²² Cited in ibid, 166.

²³ Gochenour, Theodore, “A New Try for Afghanistan”, The Middle East Journal, 19 (1965): 1–19, at 8.Google Scholar

²⁴ Akhramovich, R.T., Outline History of Afghanistan after the Second World War (Moscow: Nauka, 1966), 156.Google Scholar

²⁵ Gochenour, “A New Try for Afghanistan”, 8.

²⁶ Qasim Reshtia, S., Khaterat-e- Siyasi (Virginia: Speedy Publication, 1997), 256.Google Scholar

²⁷ Reardon, Patrick, “Modernization and Reform: The Contemporary Endeavor,” in Afghanistan: Some New Approaches, ed. Grassmuck, George et al. (Ann Arbor, MI, 1969), 188.Google Scholar

²⁸ Reshtia, Khaterat-e Siyasi, 155. These people included Abdul Zahir, Shamsoddin Marjrooh (minister of justice), Abdul Qayum (minister of the interior), Reshita (minister of the press and information), Bahoddin Majrooh (professor of philosophy at Kabul University) and Rashid Latifi (a distinguished journalist and writer).

²⁹ It is interesting to ask why Zahir Shah asked Yusuf, via Wali, to take the lead. Perhaps it was to delay establishing his own party.

³⁰ Dept of State, Embassy Kabul, “Conversation with Erstwhile Conservative Political Leader Khalilullah Khalili,” March 17, 1966.

³¹ Farhang, Sediq, Afghanistan dar Panj Qarn-e Akhir (Afghanistan in the Past Five Centuries), 2nd ed. (Tehran, 1992), 735Google Scholar; Panjsheri, Dastagir, Zuhur wa Zawal-e Hezb-e Demokratik-e Khalq-e Afghanistan (Peshawar, 1999), 184Google Scholar; Zalmai, Wali, De Istebdād aw Motlaqyat pa Moqābel ke de Zeno Afghānāno Melli Mubāreza (Kabul, 2003), 367.Google Scholar

³² Reshtia, Khaterat-e Siyasi, 255.

³³ Dept of State, “Conversation with Erstwhile Conservative Political Leader.”

³⁴ Farhang, Afghanistan dar Panj Qarn-e Akhir, 736.

³⁵ Hashim Maiwandwal, “Melyat,” Masawat 3, 5 (1969): 3; see also Dupree, “Red Flag Over Hindu Kush,” 9.

³⁶ Abdulhay Habibi, “De Afghanistan Khalek aw Shahi Mashrotyat,” Masawat 1, 5 (1967): 2; see also Marwat, Fazal-Ul-Rahman, The Evolution and Growth of Communism in Afghanistan (1917–1919): An Appraisal (Karachi, 1997), 331.Google Scholar

³⁷ Dupree, Louis, “A Note on Afghanistan: 1974,” AUFS Reports Services: South Asia Series 18 (1974): 4.Google Scholar

³⁸ Attaie asserts that the split occurred after Abdul Wali, had threatened Weesh leaders. Attaie, Muhammad Ibrahim, Negah-e Mukhtasar ba Tarikh-e Maser-e Afghanistan (Kabul, 2005), 360.Google Scholar

³⁹ Reshtia, Khatertat-e Siyasi, 303; Sabahoddin Kushkaki, Daha-e Qānoon Asāsi (Peshawar, 1986), 48.

⁴⁰ Of the seven members of the Constitutional Committee, only Sediq Farhang belonged to a previous constitutionalist group. His inclusion was due more to his relationship with the current prime minister and with his brother Reshtia, who was a senior minister and a member of the committee, than his association with constitutionalism.

⁴¹ The 27 delegates represented almost all ethnic groups in the country. According to Panjsheri, they comprised 13 Pashtun, 8 Tajik, 3 Hazara and 3 Uzbek. Panjsheri, Zuhur wa Zawal-e, 153–54.

⁴² Panjsheri Zuhur wa Zawal-e, 155.

⁴³ Quoted in Arnold, Anthony, Afghanistan's Two Party Communism: Parcham and Khalq (Stanford, CA, 1983), 139.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Dept of State, Embassy Kabul, “Formation of Afghan Political Party Report,” March 20, 1965.

⁴⁵ This is the party which seized power in 1978.

⁴⁶ For details see Arnold, Afghanistan's Two Party Communism; Panjsheri, Zuhur wa Zawal-e; Ali Keshtmand, Sultan, Yadhasht-hay Seyasi wa Roydad-hay Tarikhi (N.C., 2002)Google Scholar; Zerai, Saleh, Nempelay Khatere (Kabul, 2008).Google Scholar

⁴⁷ The two factions were reunited in 1977 and a year later the party staged a successful coup.

⁴⁸ Dept of State, Embassy Kabul, “The Afghan Left,” May 22, 1973, 3.

⁴⁹ Dupree, “A Note on Afghanistan: 1974,” 7.

⁵⁰ See Emadi, “Radical Political Movements in Afghanistan”; Peshraw, “Sho'la-ye Jawid Chegona Jeryani Bud wa Chegona Bamian Amad,” http://www.peshraw.com. The party was also known as Jeryan Demokratik-e Nawin (New Democratic Current).

⁵¹ While there is little public information about the foundation of the party in the 1960s, Emadi and Peshraw give the date as 1965. Emadi, “Radical Political Movements in Afghanistan,” 432–3; Peshraw, “Sho'la-ye Jawid Chegona Jeryani Bud wa Chegona Bamian Amad.”

⁵² Peshraw, “Sho'la-ye Jawid Chegona Jeryani Bud.” Born in 1944 and executed in 1978, Yari was the son of a Hazara landlord from Jaghori in central Afghanistan with a degree in mathematics from Kabul University. After briefly teaching at a high school in Kabul, he left for his home village to work among the peasants. Yari was the first propagator of Maoism in Afghanistan. However, except for a few articles published in Sho'la-ye Jawid, little is known about his thoughts.

⁵³ Farhang, Afghanistan dar Panj Qarn-e Akhir, 758.

⁵⁴ Adamec, Ludwig, Historical Dictionary of Afghanistan (Metuchen, NJ, 1991) 152.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Emadi, “Radical Political Movements in Afghanistan,” 433.

⁵⁶ During the crackdown on the party in 1968, almost all 14 members of its leadership were arrested and sentenced to various periods of imprisonment, from a few months to 13 years. Saikal, Modern Afghanistan, 165.

⁵⁷ For details see Peshraw, “Sho'la-i Jawid Chegona Jeryani Bud.”

⁵⁸ Dept of State, “The Afghan Left.”

⁵⁹ Khan, Mohammad Anwar, “The Emergence of Religious Parities in Afghanistan,” in Afghanistan and the Frontier, ed. Marwat, F. and Kakakhel, S. (Peshawar, 1993), 13.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ In 1972 Sebghatullah Mujadidi, a leader of the well-established religious family of the Mujadidis, founded another Islamist political party, the Jamiat al-Ulma Muhammadi, outside Kabul University. Olesen, Asta, Islam and Politics in Afghanistan (Richmond, Surrey, 1995), 234.Google Scholar However, it was little known in political circles. In 1979 Mujadidi established Jabha-ye Nejat-e Melli (National Front for the Rescue of Afghanistan) in Peshawar.

⁶¹ Roy, Olivier, “The Origins of the Islamist Movement in Afghanistan,” Central Asian Survey 3 (1984): 120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁶² After that the leadership went to Gulboddin Hekmatyar and Habib-ul Rahman.

⁶³ Niazi (born in 1932) was the godfather of political Islam in Afghanistan. All sources agree that he was the first Afghan to import the ideas of the Muslim Brotherhood from Egypt. Edwards, David, Before the Taliban: Genealogies of the Afghan Jihad (Berkeley, CA, 2002), 238.Google Scholar He was arrested in 1974 and in “1977 was given life imprisonment and subsequently was killed.” Khan, “The Emergence of Religious Parities in Afghanistan,” 19. Many Islamist leaders in Afghanistan in the last four decades, including Rabani and Rasoul Sayaf, were his students.

⁶⁴ Roy, Olivier, “Has Islamism a Future in Afghanistan,” in Fundamentalism Reborn?: Afghanistan and the Taliban, ed. Maley, W. (New York, 1998), 201Google Scholar; Edwards, Before the Taliban, 235. In the 1950s and 1960s lecturers from Al-Azhar were employed at Kabul University. Roy, Olivier, Islam and Resistance in Afghanistan (Cambridge, 1986), 70Google Scholar; Williams, Robert, “Legal Education in Afghanistan Prior to the Soviet Occupation,” Suffolk Transnational Law Journal 6, no. 2 (1982): 260.Google Scholar Visiting professors from al-Azhar taught at the Faculty of Theology, and some Afghan lecturers studied at Al-Azhar.

⁶⁵ The fact that Qazi Hosain Ahmed, who was to become the leader of Jamat-i Islami of Pakistan in the 1980s, was himself a Pashtun, had been in charge of Afghanistan affairs in the 1970s and traveled to Afghanistan frequently, further connected the parties. Roy, “Has Islamism a Future in Afghanistan,” 201.

⁶⁶ Edwards notes that the “overt reason for this … was the student group's association with the Jamat-i Islami Pakistan and their advocacy of a foreign ideology which many students, Shiia in particular, considered dogmatic in nature and inappropriate to the Afghan context.” Edwards, David, “The Evolution of Shi΄i Political Dissent in Afghanistan”, in Shi΄ism and Social Protest, ed. Cole, J.I. and Keddie, N.R. (New Haven, CT, 1986), 218.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Fazelghani Mujadidi, “Naqsh-e Pohantoon-e Kabul dar Jihad Elai Komunizem dar Afghanistan,” Omaid 4, no. 45 (1996): 8. Roy notes the works were translated by party members Mawlawi Khalis, Rabani and Reshad. Roy, Islam and Resistance in Afghanistan, 60. Mujajdidi gives the name of the Pashtu translator as Muhammad Jan Ahmadzai. Mujajdidi, “Naqsh-e Pohantoon-e Kabul,” 8. In addition, some of Qutb's works had been translated into Persian in Iran and were available in Kabul. Olesen, Islam and Politics in Afghanistan, 228.

⁶⁸ Dept of State, Embassy Kabul, “Merajoddin: Portrait of a Moslem Youth Extremist,” May 29, 1972.

⁶⁹ See Edwards, Before the Taliban, 212–16. Edwards' interviews with these party members took place in Peshawar during the 1980s.

⁷⁰ Kakar, Hassan, “The Fall of the Afghan Monarchy in 1973,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 9 (1978): 203.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁷¹ Kakar, Afghanistan: The Soviet Invasion, 88.

⁷² Vogelsang, Willem, The Afghans (Oxford, 2008), 298–9.Google Scholar

⁷³ Zalmai, De Istebdād aw Motlaqyat pa Moqāble, 376.

⁷⁴ Quoted in Marwat, The Evolution and Growth of Communism in Afghanistan, 329–30.

⁷⁵ Dept of State, “The Afghan Left,” 7.

⁷⁶ The party is still active and many of its leaders are serving in the Karzai government. The leader of the party, Anwar al-Haq Ahady (born 1951), is minister of trade.

⁷⁷ One of the main characteristics of the major ideological parties, of both the Left and the Right, was that soon after their foundation they split into factions and operated separately. Most of the time, there was fierce confrontation between the factions, including through the publication of night letters against each other. Sazman-e Jawanan-e Motaraqi was the most affected organization.

⁷⁸ Even those parties which advocated “nationalism,” such as Afghan Sosyal Demokrat (which advocated a Greater Afghanistan), were based on ethnic nationalism and were socialist-oriented parties. Marwat, The Evolution and Growth of Communism in Afghanistan, 330.

⁷⁹ One of the best examples of such a belief is a story related to the former prime minister and the king's uncle, Muhammad Hashim. According to the story, one day Hashim took the monarch to his house and showed him his starving chickens, which on seeing him rushed towards him and followed him as he walked around. The next day they walked in the same place, but this time the chickens did not pay any attention to Hashim, because they were full. Hashim concluded that if subjects, like chickens, are starved they will follow you, but if they are full they no longer care. Years after the death of Hashim and even after the removal of the monarchy this story was very popular, among both educated and uneducated people. I heard it in the early 1970s in Kabul.

⁸⁰ According to Majrooh, a professor of philosophy at Kabul University at the time: “Having learned the new ideas about time, history, and rapid changes, educated groups became impatient … The intellectuals did not believe that a process of evolution would achieve anything; in any event it would have been too slow a process for them. They wished to see the changes in their own lifetime. For this reason, the myth of revolution in their eyes took on the form of a magic means to fulfill all their dreams … In this respect …, Marxism-Leninism presented the most attractive prospect: it was magic with a scientific and rational appearance, a rational dream bound to succeed.” Majrooh, Bahauddin, “Afghan Intellectuals in Exile: Philosophical and Psychological Dimensions,” in The Cultural Basis of Afghan Nationalism, ed. Anderson, E.W. and Dupree, N.H. (London and New York, 1990), 78.Google Scholar

⁸¹ Saikal, Modern Afghanistan, 156; Dupree, “Red Flag Over Hindu Kush,” 9. For the program of the party, see Arya, Najim, Muhammad Hashim Maiwandwal (Peshawar, 1999).Google Scholar In the context of the political environment since the early 1980s, Maiwandwal's followers tried, albeit unsuccessfully, to hide some of these principles, especially those on constitutional monarchy and socialism (see for example Arya, Muhammad Hashim Maiwandwal, especially 71–127). They tried to depict the party as a nationalist and Islamic-oriented organization. This is exactly the case with Afghan Sosyal Demokrat Party, which tries to portray the party as a nationalist Islamic-oriented political party. See for example Wakman, Amin, Afghanistan at the Crossroads (New Delhi, 1985).Google Scholar

⁸² Interestingly, even conservative and pro-establishment groups such as Jabha-ye Melli (National Front) included socialist ideas in their aims: “The National Front, while having a national orientation, through its publications tries to pave the way for the progress of national socialism and the establishment of unity among the Afghan people.” Jabha-ye Melli, “Ahdaf-e Nasherati Jarida-ye Jabha-ye Melli,” January 7, 1969, 1.

⁸³ Maiwandwal served as ambassador to Washington, Islamabad and London. However, it was an indirect reference to Maiwandwal in the publication of a translated article in Afghan Mellat which accused some Afghan officials of association with the CIA during their studies in the USA. That was one of the reasons for his resignation.

⁸⁴ Maiwandwal allegedly staged a coup in 1973 but was arrested along with 45 officers and civilians and was strangled while under interrogation. For Maiwandwal and his role in the alleged coup, see Dupree, Louis, “A Note on Afghanistan: 1974,” AUFS Reports Services: South Asia Series 18 (1974): 3–5.Google Scholar The official version of his death was that he committed suicide. For a detailed account about his alleged suicide, see Azhar, Samad, Khodkoshi ya Qatel: Asrar-e Marg-e Hashim Maiwandwal) (Peshawar, 2012).Google Scholar Azhar was chief investigator of the Maiwandwal case.

⁸⁵ Because of these contradictions the Jamiat-e Demokrat-e Motaraqi party did not survive, in part because no other groups—left, right or nationalist—trusted it.

⁸⁶ Between 1973 and 1978 the right and left-wing political parties, which operated underground, turned to military uprisings. While the Islamist revolt of July 1975 failed, the April 1978 coup staged by the leftist PDPA succeeded.