Lessons for the future
Jagat S. Mehta
DIARIES OF FIELD MARSHALL MOHAMMAD AYUB KHAN, 1966-1972 C.E. Baxter Oxford University Press, 2007, 638 pp., price not stated
October 2007, volume 31, No 10

For the Oxford University Press to publish in 2007, a nearly 600- page diary of Field Marshall Ayub Khan, covering only the period 1966-72, evokes suspicions of fulfilling a promise to his expired son Gohar. However, the Press managed to persuade Professor C.E. Baxter to edit the dated diary. These were afternoon years for the Field Marshall before being dislodged from the Presidency and after 1969 the sunset of an eventful life. There is intermittent anxiety but basic confidence that the Two Nation theory of religion-based cohesion could overcome the handicaps of geography, language and culture and keep Pakistan united was falsified in his own lifetime.

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