Ghulam Hussain Hidayatullah

Khan Bahadur Sir Ghulam Hussain Hidayatullah (January 1879 – 4 October 1948) was a colonial Indian and Pakistani politician from Sindh: the first Premier of Sindh after its separation from Bombay (1937–1938), Premier again from 1942 to 1947, and then the first Governor of Sindh in Pakistan (1947–1948) — the only Pakistani, the English article notes, to hold a provincial governorship in Pakistan at independence, all the other governors being British. ¹

He was born in January 1879 at Shikarpur in Sindh — Wikidata gives February 1879, and the difference is carried as debated in his record — and was educated at Shikarpur High School, Sindh Madressah at Karachi, D. J. Sindh College at Karachi and Government Law College, Bombay. ^{1 2} He is a different person from Hidayatullah of Banjar in Southeast Asia, whose record stands separately in this museum. ²

After completing his LL.B. in 1902 he started legal practice at Hyderabad in Sindh, and began his public career as vice-president of the Hyderabad Municipality; he was also the first non-official president of the Hyderabad District Board. ¹ In 1921 he became a member of the Bombay Legislative Council and in the same year a minister in the Bombay Government, an office he held until 1928, when he was made a member of the Governor of Bombay's Executive Council, serving until 1934. ¹ He received the title Khan Bahadur, was knighted in the 1926 New Year Honours, and was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of the Star of India (KCSI) in the 1933 Birthday Honours. ¹ As a minister he was associated with the Sukkur Barrage project, which contributed so much to the later prosperity of Sindh. ¹

With Khan Bahadur Muhammad Ayub Khuhro, Syed Miran Shah and Sir Shah Nawaz Bhutto, he represented Sindh at the Round Table Conferences in London, where they convinced the chairman of the Committee on Sindh that Sindh was not to be a deficit province and could sustain itself as a full province. ¹ Sindh was separated from Bombay, and its first assembly came into being in 1937. ¹

He became the first Chief Minister (Premier) of Sindh, from 28 April 1937 to 23 March 1938, succeeded by Allah Bux Soomro; his second term ran from 14 October 1942 to 14 August 1947, again succeeding Soomro — the article's career section conflates this term with Soomro's dates, against its own infobox and the Urdu article, and the infobox is followed here. ^{1 3} In 1943, under his government, the Sindh Assembly became the first provincial assembly of the subcontinent to pass an official resolution in favour of the creation of Pakistan. ¹ When the Muslim League decided in 1946 on a policy of renouncing British titles, he renounced his. ¹ After partition he became the first Governor of Sindh, holding the office from August 1947 until his death. ¹ The English article also records that he was opposed to the partition of India. ¹

The Urdu article's infobox records his marriage in 1940 to Fatima Sughra Begum. ³ His son Anwar Hussain Hidayatullah married Doulat Haroon, a daughter of Abdullah Haroon. ¹ No source read names a religion or school for him, and his record says so plainly: schooling, offices and family connections attest none.

Within a month of the death of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, he died at Karachi on 4 October 1948, still in office as governor. ¹ The Urdu article's prose gives 14 October 1948, against its own infobox and the other sources — apparently confusing the date with his assumption of the chief ministership on 14 October 1942 — and the agreed date is the one recorded. ³

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