Sharof Rashidov

Sharof Rashidovich Rashidov (Uzbek Cyrillic: Шароф Рашидович Рашидов, ; Шараф Рашидович Рашидов; 6 November 1917 – 31 October 1983) was the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Uzbekistan from 1959 until his death in 1983.

During his tenure the Uzbek SSR saw considerable economic growth and had a very high degree of autonomy from the rest of the Soviet Union.

Rashidov was born on 6 November 1917, the day before the Russian Revolution.

He was born to an Uzbek peasant family in Sovungarlik village, located in what is now the Jizzakh region of Uzbekistan.

Although his family was poor, both of his parents were among the few that were literate at the time, and they wanted their six children to be educated.

Sharof Rashidov's father, Rashid Khalilov, was a farmer who joined the Qizil karvon kolkhoz, and his mother Kuysinoy was a housewife.

Initially after graduating from the Jizzakh Pedagogical College in 1935 he worked as a schoolteacher in a secondary school before starting to work for the regional Samarkand newspaper Leninsky put. He then graduated from the philological faculty of Samarkand State University in 1941, but later that year he was deployed to the Eastern Front as a junior lieutenant.

He saw combat in the Battle of Moscow and was awarded two Order of the Red Star before being demobilized in 1943 after being severely wounded in the war.

Having returned to Uzbekistan, he worked as editor of the Lenin yoli newspaper of Samarkand from 1943 to 1944, then became the secretary of the Samarkand regional committee before worked as the executive editor Qizil Oʻzbekistoni from 1947-1949.

In 1947 he began his career as a deputy in the Supreme Soviet of the Uzbek SSR, where he served as a deputy in the 2nd to 9th convocations.

He also was a student of the All-Union Party School under the Central Committee of the Party, graduating in absentia in 1948.

In 1949 he became the chairman of the board of the Union of Writers of the Uzbek SSR, but moved on from the post in 1950, as he became the chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Uzbek SSR, which he held until 1959.

He continued to rise in power, becoming a candidate member of the Central Committee of the Communist party in 1956.

In 1957 Rashidov accompanied Kliment Voroshilov on a diplomatic trip to visit Indonesia, Burma, China, and Vietnam, where he met with leaders of anti-colonial movements.

In March 1959 he became the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Uzbekistan, a post he held until his death in 1983.

After coming to power in 1959 he began a series of purges of Tashkent-aligned politicians from leadership positions in the Uzbek SSR.

In 1961 he became a member of the Central Committee of the Communist party as well as a candidate member of the Presidium of the Central Committee.

Rashidov was the de facto leader of the Samarkand faction of Uzbek politics, which encountered rivalry from other factions, especially the Tashkent faction.

Although his first visits to Cuba dealt with agricultural matters, in 1962 he was part of a Soviet delegation to Cuba sent by Khrushchev in the prelude to the Cuban missile crisis.

During the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965, Rashidov was instrumental in the organization of peace talks in Tashkent, were the two countries signed the Tashkent Declaration peace agreement in 1966.

While the negotiations were officially led by Alexei Kosygin, Rashidov was more involved in the peace process.

During the Afghan wars Rashidov welcomed Afghan students to study at universities in the Uzbek SSR and frequently corresponded with government bodies of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan emphasizing his support of their endeavors.

After the devastating earthquake of 1966 the city of Tashkent was rebuilt and experienced significant urbanization, with the construction of the Tashkent Metro and expansion of the city as well as other socially oriented construction projects throughout the republic.

Another project of Rashidov was the Mubarek zone, a plan to push exiled Crimeans to “take root” in the desolate Mubarek district of the Qashqadaryo Region.

The Mubarek district was absolutely nothing like the coastal Crimean homeland that Crimean Tatars had been longing for, and the climate was inhospitable.

Most Crimean Tatars grew to see the project as just another Rashidov scam to fleece Moscow of money, and found the suggestions that anywhere in Central Asia was their "real" homeland to be chauvinist.

Under Rashidov in 1966, the capital of Uzbekistan, Tashkent, was rebuilt, and new museums, parks, theaters, and monuments were erected.

In 1969 Yadgar Nasriddinova of the Tashkent faction, Rafiq Nishonov of the Fergana faction, and Rahmonqul Qurbonov of the Bukhara faction attempted to depose him from his position as first secretary, utilizing an anti-Russian rally at a sports event as a pretext to get Moscow to reject him.

However, Rashidov prevailed, and the leaders of the plot lost their power in Uzbek SSR politics, with Nasriddinova and Nishonov getting union-level positions but Qurbonov facing imprisonment.

Rashidov had strong support from Brezhnev, who in turn allocated resources to projects industrializing the Uzbek SSR and protected him from investigation.

For decades, the Uzbek SSR had an extremely high degree of autonomy compared to other republics in the union.

While other Soviet politicians of similar status feared the KGB and Community Party apparatuses giving such entities a great degree of control, those very same institutions based in Uzbek SSR feared Rashidov, whose close ties to Brezhnev enabled him to deviate from party norms far more than other politicians.

People who expressed disagreement with Rashidov faced severe retaliation, as Rashidov maintained a network of informers using a "divide and conquer" method to ensure loyalty to him from his associates.

His opponents likened him to a Khan of the previous century for the amount of control he exercised over the republic.

During Rashidov's tenure the Uzbek SSR experienced rapid economic growth, not only in the agricultural sector but also urbanization and industrialization.

The Tashkent Aviation Production Association named after V.P. Chkalov became one of the largest aircraft producers in the world; in 1969 the Muruntau mine began extraction of gold, which became one of the most important mines in the Soviet Union.

In 1969, an international symposium on the history of art of the Timurid period was held in Samarkand.

In 1970, the 2500th anniversary of Samarkand was celebrated, and in this connection great events were held in Samarkand, a museum of the city's history and an opera and ballet theater were opened.

In 1977, for the first time in Central Asia, a subway was opened in Tashkent.

He also served as a delegate to the 19th to 24th Congresses of the Communist party.