Sheikh Rasheed Ahmad

Early life and education

Ahmed was born on 6 November 1950 in in Babra Bazaar in Rawalpindi, Punjab.

He received his early education in from Polytechnic College and graduated from the Gordon College. He completed his Bachelor of Laws at the University of Lahore.

Ahmed was used to be a leader of the students union in the Gordon College.

Political career

Ahmed began his political career during his student years and was actively involved against the military regime of Ayub Khan.

In Pakistani general election, 1985, he was elected as the member of the National Assembly for the first time from Rawalpindi on Pakistan Muslim League (N) ticket.

In Pakistani general election, 1988, he was re-elected as the member of the National Assembly for the second time from Rawalpindi on [[Islamic Democratic Alliance ]] (IDA) ticket.

In Pakistani general election, 1990, he was re-elected as the member of the National Assembly for the third time from Rawalpindi on IDA ticket.

In Pakistani general election, 1993, he was re-elected as the member of the National Assembly for the fourth time from Rawalpindi on PML (N) ticket.

In Pakistani general election, 1997, he was re-elected as the member of the National Assembly for the fifth time from Rawalpindi.

In Pakistani general election, 2002, PML-N refused to allot ticket to Ahmed for running in the election. Ahmed was re-elected in the 2002 election as the member of the National Assembly for the sixth time from Rawalpindi as independent candidate.

Later he joined PML-Q.

Since Ahmad was considered a close aide of Pervez Musharraf therefore during his sixth tenure as member of the National Assembly, he was appointed as Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting in the Zafarullah Khan Jamali cabinet in November 2002.

As minister for information, Ahmed, on public places, had assumed the role of the spokesman of Pervez Musharraf and advocate of government of Zafarullah Khan Jamali.

In May 2006, he was made Federal Minister for Railways.

He also served as Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly of Pakistan.

In Pakistani general election, 2008, Ahmed ran for the membership of National Assembly on Pakistan Muslim League-Q ticket however lost the election for the first time from both of his Rawalpindi constituencies, NA-55 and NA-56 to PML-N. There were rumours that Ahmed had fled to Spain following the defeat. However, these allegations were later discovered to be false. In an interview, Ahmed said defeat in the election was due to raid on Lal Masjid and that "he had promised to quit politics after 2008 elections but his defeat had changed his mind."

He later left PML-Q where he was a senior vice-president and created his own political party Awami Muslim League (Pakistan) and self appointed himself as president of the party.

In February 2010, while Ahmed was preparing to run for the seat of National Assembly in by-election in NA-55, Rawalpindi, he was attacked by unknown gunmen at his election office in Rawalpindi. It was believed Taliban militants were behind the attack which injured Ahmed and killed three others known to be his bodyguards. Ahmed earlier supported President Musharraf's military operation against the militants in Federally Administered Tribal Areas and the Siege of Lal Masjid and has been on the hit list of militants. He was defeated in the by-elections by a wide margin.

In Pakistani general election, 2013, Ahmed made an electoral alliance with Imran Khan to support each other in their respective constituencies in the election. It was reported that Ahmed has requested for a merger between his party and the PTI however PTI decided not to go for an alliance with any political party.

He was re-elected as the member of the National Assembly for the seventh time from Rawalpindi.

In public circles, he is known for making witty remarks and political predictions. He is also known for switching political allegiances from one party to another.

Controversies

In 2005, India Today reported that Yasin Malik claimed that Ahmed had ran a jihadi camp at Fateh Jung in Punjab, where around 3,500 jihadis were trained. Ahmed denied running such a camp. Later it was reported that Yasin Malik retracted his statements and denied he had ever said that Ahmed running camps.

In 2005, during Ahmed tenure as Minister for Information, he applied for permit to travel to Srinagar, in his personal capacity to visit the graves of his grandparents and meet his relatives in Jammu & Kashmir. However Indian denied Ahmed's request to travel to Srinagar.

In 2004, Ahmed during his tenure as Minister for Information was replaced with Shaukat Aziz as minister-in-waiting who would receive then visiting Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee after Indian foreign ministry's objection to the nomination of Ahmad as minister-in-waiting.

In 2012, Ahmed was detained at Houston airport concerning his links with Lashkar-e-Taiba and with Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, an alleged mastermind of 2008 Mumbai attacks. He was released after five hours of interrogation after official protest from Pakistani Ambassador in United States.

In 2014, Ahmed was off-loaded from a Toronto bound PIA flight due to non-issuance of clearance by the Canadian authorities.