Abdul Hai Habibi

Abdul Hai Habibi was born in 1910 in Kandahar into an illustrious scholarly lineage. Appointed editor of the journal Tulu-i Afghan at age twenty-two, he emerged as the leading philologist of the Pashto language and founding president of the Pashto Tolana (Pashto Academy).

Habibi served as the founding dean of the Faculty of Literature at Kabul University and cultural advisor to the Ministry of Education. In 1944, he published the critical edition of Pata Khazana (The Hidden Treasure), an 18th-century anthology of ancient Pashto poetry. His monumental two-volume Short History of Afghanistan remains a standard academic reference across Central Asian universities.