Sayed Wiqar Ali Shah

Professor (Dr.) Sayed Wiqar Ali Shah, an eminent historian, is Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Social Sciences at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad. He is a former Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Chairperson of the Department of History at the same university. Born on January 10, 1961, he earned his Master’s and M.Phil. degrees from Peshawar University with distinction, followed by a D.Phil. from the University of Oxford (UK). He is a double Gold Medallist and completed his Ph.D. on frontier politics, focusing on the last ten years before the Partition of India. His expertise includes Modern Afghanistan, Pashto language and literature, political parties and leadership, gender studies, and the erstwhile tribal areas of Pakistan.

Professor Shah served Quaid-i-Azam University for over thirty years (February 1, 1990 – January 9, 2021) in various capacities, including Acting Vice Chancellor, Senior Dean, Member of the Syndicate, Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Chairperson of the Department of History (two tenures), Provost of Boys’ Hostels, Chairman of the Admission Committee, Chairman of the Affiliation Committee, Chairperson of the Harassment Committee, and Director of the Area Study Centre. He supervised twenty-three Ph.D. dissertations and sixty-nine M.Phil. theses.

Professor Wiqar Ali Shah has published extensively on frontier politics, Khushal Khan Khattak, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the Khudai Khidmatgars, women and politics in the Frontier Province, the Muslim League in the North-West Frontier Province, and the Freedom Movement. To date, he has published over thirty-five research articles in both international and national journals. He is the author of fifteen books, including the popular Ethnicity, Islam and Nationalism: Muslim Politics in the North-West Frontier Province, 1937–1947 (Oxford, 1999, 2000, 2015). His latest book, a political biography of Abdul Ghani Khan, published in January 2021, was awarded the Best Pashto Book of the Year by the Academy of Letters, Islamabad, the Abasin Arts Council, Peshawar, and the 11th UBL Awards.

Professor Wiqar Ali Shah has received one of Germany’s most prestigious fellowships, the Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship. In this capacity, he has visited and stayed at the University of Heidelberg more than ten times and served as the Allama Iqbal Professor there from 2009 to 2014.