Älichan Bökeichan

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Älichan Bökeichan

Älichan Nurmuchameduly Bökeichan ( Kazakh Әлихан Нұрмұхамедұлы Бөкейхан , Russian Алихан Нурмухамедович Букейханов Alikhan Nurmuchamedowitsch Bukeichanow * 5. March 1866 in the district Karkaraly , Oblast Semipalatinsk , Russian Empire ; † 27. September 1937 in Moscow ) was a Kazakh politician and publicist .

Life

Early years

Älichan Bökeichan was born in 1866 in the Karkaraly district of Semipalatinsk Oblast in the Russian Empire, the oldest of five children. He and his family were prince descendants of the Bökey horde . His father first sent him to a madrasa , but a short time later he attended the Russian-Kazakh school in Karkaraly. He graduated from the Technical School in Omsk in 1890 and later studied at the Forestry Institute in Saint Petersburg . There he also took an active part in political, literary and economic activities and began to think about the situation of the Kazakh people in his homeland. He came to the conclusion that his people needed knowledge and culture in order to free themselves from Russian hegemony. His aim was to improve people's education and culture and thereby improve their living conditions.

Political activities

After graduating, Bökeichan returned to Omsk. Here he established close relationships with politically like-minded people and began to actively participate in social and political work. In 1905 he joined the Constitutional Democratic Party . He organized a small group of supporters of the party among Kazakh intellectuals. The time in Omsk was particularly decisive for the development of his political views, so he was one of the supporters of a progressive and Pan-Turkic movement that no longer saw the future of the Kyrgyz steppe under Russian rule and at the same time wanted to realize a western culture.

At the end of 1905, Bökeichan wanted to establish a Kyrgyz branch of the Constitutional Democratic Party at a party congress, but this attempt failed. In January 1906 he was arrested as the leader of the Kyrgyz political movement and was not released from custody until the end of April. In June 1906 he came to Semipalatinsk, where he was elected to the first State Duma as a member of the region . He only reached St. Petersburg after the Duma had already been dissolved by the Tsar. After all, he was one of the signatories of the Vyborg Manifesto , which called for resistance to the government of Tsar Nicholas II . He was then arrested again and was in exile in Samara until 1917 . Between 1913 and 1918 he edited the weekly newspaper Qazaq together with Akhmet Baitursynuly and Mirschaqyp Dulatuly . In it he published articles in which he confronted readers with Russian and European history, culture and literature.

Achmet Baitursynuly , Älichan Bökeichan and Mirschaqyp Dulatuly , 1913

After the Russian February Revolution of 1917 , differences arose between Bökeichan and his comrades in the Constitutional Democratic Party. He found no support for his central demand, the autonomy of the Kazakh people, or for other political demands. The party itself advocated keeping the Russian Empire within its existing borders. He finally resigned from her a little later. In July 1917, the first All-Kyrgyz Muslim Congress took place in Orenburg , calling for the creation of an autonomous Kazakh nation-state within the empire. Bökeichan was also one of the most influential members and chairman of the Alash party . In December 1917, the Alash Orda (Kyrgyz Autonomy) was proclaimed at the second All-Kyrgyz Muslim Congress . As chairman of the Alasch Orda, Bökeichan was its head of government.

After the defeat by the Red Army in the Russian Civil War , the Alash Orda began to disintegrate. After a series of negotiations, the leaders of the Alash Orda were forced to recognize the power of the Bolsheviks and Bokeichan had to give up his political activities.

Late years and death

After Bökeichan was no longer allowed to be politically active, he now dealt with the cultural area. He began to take a critical look at Marxism and socialism . This activity was viewed as oppositional, however, he was accused of a counter-revolutionary struggle against the Soviet power. He was arrested twice in the 1920s. The Bolsheviks feared the influence that Bokeichan had on the people and forbade him to travel to his Kazakh homeland. He was placed under house arrest and lived in Moscow for ten years . However, he repeatedly received visits from important Kazakh personalities and encouraged his followers to be active in the fields of literature and science. On July 26, 1937, he was arrested again by NKVD officials and questioned about his activities in the Alash Autonomy. He was sentenced to death on September 27 and executed the same day.

literature

  • Didar Kassymova, Zhanat Kundakbayeva, Ustina Markus: Historical Dictionary of Kazakhstan (=  Historical Dictionaries of Asia, Oceania, and the Middle East ). Scarecrow Press, Lanham 2012, ISBN 0-8108-6782-6 (English).
  • Akkuly, Sultan-Khan: Childhood and boyhood of the future leader of the nation: Alikhan was born different . Prague 2012 (English, e-history.kz [PDF]).

Web links

Commons : Älichan Bökeichan  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Childhood and boyhood of the future leader of the nation: Alikhan was born different
  2. a b c d Бокейханов Алихан (1866–27 сентября 1937 гг.) , Accessed on March 2, 2019 (Russian).
  3. Alikhan Bukeikhan: prison epopee , accessed on March 2, 2019.
  4. Kendirbaeva, Gulnar: 'We are children of Alash ...'. The Kazakh intelligentsia at the beginning of the 20th century in search of national identity and prospects of the cultural survival of the Kazakh people , accessed on March 2, 2019 (PDF).
  5. Execution day of Alikhan Bukeikhanov , accessed on March 1, 2019.