| Inayatullah Khan | |
|---|---|
| King of Afghanistan | |
 Portrait of Inayatuallah Khan, 1929 | |
| King of Afghanistan | |
| Reign | 14 January 1929 – 17 January 1929 |
| Predecessor | Amanullah Khan |
| Successor | Habibullāh Kalakāni (In Kabul) Ali Ahmad Khan (In Jalalabad) |
| Born | 20 October 1888 Kabul, Emirate of Afghanistan |
| Died | 12 August 1946 (aged 57) Tehran, Imperial Iran |
| Consort | Khairiya Khanum Effendi |
| Dynasty | Barakzai |
| Father | Habibullah Khan |
| Mother | Jamal Begum |
| Religion | Sunni Islam |
Inayatullah Khan (Pashto/Dari: عنايت الله خان), (20 October 1888 – 12 August 1946) was the King of Afghanistan for three days in January 1929. He was the son of former Afghan Emir, Habibullah Khan. Inayatullah's brief reign ended with his abdication.
Khan was born into a Pashtun family. In the middle of the night, on 14 January 1929, Amanullah Khan handed over his throne to his brother Inayatullah Khan and tried to secretly escape from Kabul to Kandahar. Habibullāh Kalakāni and his followers chased Amanullah's Rolls-Royce on horseback but Amanullah managed to escape.
With the King gone, Kalakani wrote a letter to Inayatullah to either surrender or prepare for war. Inayatullah's response was that he had never sought nor wished to be king and agreed to abdicate and proclaim Kalakani as king on 17 January 1929. Inayatullah was airlifted out of Kabul by the Royal Air Force[1] and spent the remainder of his life in exile. In August 1929, during the Afghan Civil War (1928–1929), there were rumours in Kabul that rupees bearing Inayatullah's name were circulating among anti-Kalakani forces. This led some to believe that Inaytullah had begun to contest the Afghan throne. However, nothing came of this, and the rumours quickly subsided.[2] Inayatullah remained in Iran, until his death in Tehran in 1946.
- ^ "RAF 'Heroes of Kabul': 80th Anniversary. Royal Air Force official website". Archived from the original on 5 January 2016. Retrieved 1 January 2011.
- ^ Muḥammad, Fayz̤; Hazārah, Fayz̤ Muḥammad Kātib (1999). Kabul Under Siege: Fayz Muhammad's Account of the 1929 Uprising. Markus Wiener Publishers. pp. 232, 233. ISBN 9781558761551.