Sister celebrates Pak A-G’s appointment

“Aziz had a very bright academic career right from his school days. He valued education for women. But for his total support, I could not have studied beyond senior school”, recalls a nostalgic Kureishi (63), who retired as professor of English literature from the local H L Commerce College three years ago.

Munshi was born into a highly educated and cultured family of Jamalpur. His father Abdulla Munshi, popularly known as Abdulla Master (he started out as a school teacher), was a judge in the local small-cause court and a driving force behind Baitulmal, the charitable institution that looks after widows and destitutes.

The family was also well-connected. Abdulla Munshi’s sister was married to I I Chunnarigar, a leading light of the Muslim League, who became Prime Minister of Pakistan for a brief period in 1955. This matrimonial link later saw the entire family except Amirunnisha migrating to Pakistan.

It so happened that in 1954, on his way back after completing his M.Tech in London, Aziz’s eldest brother Allauddin stopped over at Karachi to meet Chunnarigar, then a leading lawyer in the port city. Allauddin was offered a well-paying job and decided to settle down there.

A couple of years later, he called over Aziz Munshi to Karachi, where he started practising under Chunnarigar. After Abdulla Munshi retired in 1957, the entire family — including Aziz’s younger brother Rashid (now a dentist settled in Australia) and youngest sister Iqbalunnisha — followed.

Incidentally, Pervez Musharraf’s special adviser Sharifuddin Peerzada hails from Godhra and is related to Aziz Munshi. US-settled Iqbalunnisha’s son is married to Peerzada’s daughter, while her (Iqbalunnisha’s) daughter is married to Peerzada’s son.

Munshi’s big break came in 1966, when international arbitrers intervened in the dispute over the Rann of Kutch. The Pakistani authorities were looking for someone who could interpret old documents written in Gujarati, when Chunnarigar suggested his nephew’s name. Munshi flew to Geneva with the Pakistani legal team in Geneva, researching Gujarati documents to prepare the Pakistani brief. In the final award, Chhad Bet, the grasslands second only to Banni in size, were given to Pakistan.

Apart from becoming a sought-after legal counsel, Munshi went on to become the attorney-general in the Junejo government. “He was very intelligent, had a magnetic physical presence and excellent debating skills”, says his friend S F Kadri, adding that if he had stayed on in India, he would have certainly made it to the Supreme Court.

According to Aziz’s childhood friend Nizamuddin Faruqi, who met him in Pakistan a few years ago, Munshi enjoyed catching up with the latest on his alma mater Gujarat College, the Law Gardens, Kankaria Lake and common friends, Hindus as well as Muslims. “His doors are open to any Ahmedabadi, even those with whom he has only a nodding acquaintance”, he adds.

Known for his generous hospitality, Munshi lives in a `little Gujarat’ in Karachi today: the Jinnah Cooperative Housing Society, where he lives with his wife Rukiah Begum — a grand-daughter of Chunnarigar — is home only to Muslims from Gujarat. Bilal, aged 19, and his eldest son, studies Political Science at the University of Boston, while Abdullah, aged 17, is a freshman at the University of California.

Aziz has visited Ahmedabad twice after migrating to Pakistan: The first time, when he escorted his seriously ill father, who didn’t want to die in a “foreign country”, and again after his death.