Tikka Khan, Zia-ul Haq and That One Pakistani Prime Minister

A hero in Rawalpindi, Lt-General Tikka Khan was a genocidal maniac in Dhaka. As martial law administrator of erstwhile East Pakistan in 1971, he earned the title 'Butcher of Bangladesh'

In March 1971, Khan launched Operation Searchlight, a euphemism for genocide of up to 3 million Bengalis by West Pakistan Army.

Bangladesh became an independent nation in December 1971. The following year, Khan, despite helming over unprecedented atrocities in erstwhile East Pakistan, became Pakistan Army's chief in 1972. He joined Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party on retirement in 1976.

Zulfiqar's daughter Benazir, during her first prime ministerial tenure, appointed him as governor of Punjab in 1988.

Pakistani PM Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1976 superseded five army generals to make relatively junior Zia-Ul-Haq Tikka's successor. Zia-ul-Haq took over Bhutto in an unprecedented military coup. Under Zia, Bhutto was sentenced to death after conviction by a military court a widely disputed murder case. As Pakistanis said then: 'After Tikka came the masala'.