Ashfaq Ullah Khan was born on 22 October 1900 in Shahjahanpur, a historical city of Uttar Pradesh. His father, Shafiq Ullah Khan belonged to a Pathan family who was famous for militancy. His maternal side was more knowledgeable where so many members had served in the police and administrative services of British India. His mother Mazhoor-Un-Nisa Begum was an extremely glamorous lady. Ashfaq was the youngest amongst all his four brothers. His elder brother Riyasat Ullah Khan was a classmate of Pandit Ram Prasad Bismil. When Bismil was declared absconder after the Mainpuri Conspiracy, Riyasat used to tell his younger brother Ashfaq about the bravery and shayari Urdu poetry of Bismil. Since then Ashfaq was very keen to meet Bismil, because of his poetic attitude. In 1920, when Bismil came to Shahjahanpur and engaged himself in business, Ashfaq tried so many times to contact him but Bismil paid no attention.
In 1922, when Non-Cooperation movement started and Bismil organised meetings in Shahjahanpur to tell the public about the movement, Ashfaq met him in a public meeting and introduced himself as a younger brother of his classmate. He also told Bismil that he wrote poems under the pen-names of ‘Warsi’ and ‘Hasrat’. Thus a very good poetic alignment between Ashfaq and Bismil developed and it was so familiar that whosoever listened to them in any of the poetic conferences called Mushaira in Urdu language was overwhelmed with surprise.
To give a fillip to their movement and buy arms and ammunition to carry out their activities, the revolutionaries organised a meeting on 8 August 1925 at Shahjahanpur. After a lot of deliberations it was decided to loot the government treasury carried in the 8-Down Saharanpur—Lucknow passenger train. On 9 August 1925, Ashfaqulla Khan and eight other revolutionaries looted the train under the leadership of Pandit Ram Prasad Bismil. They were Rajendra Lahiri from Varanasi, Sachindra Nath Bakshi from Bengal, Chandra Shekhar Azad from Unnao, Keshab Chakravorthy from Calcutta, Banwari Lal from Rai Bareli, Mukundi Lal from Etawah, Manmath Nath Gupta from Benaras and Murari Lal from Shahjahanpur.
On Monday, 19 December 1927, Ashfaq Ullah Khan is known to have taken two steps at a time, as he walked up to the post. When his chains were released, he reached for the hanging rope and kissed it by saying these words: “My hands are not soiled with the murder of man. The charges framed against me are a bare false. Allah will give me the justice.”
Vocabulary
Absconder—a person who is absconding
Loot—rob
