Sultan Majid Afandiyev

Sultan Majid Afandiyev
Born	Template:Birth date Shamakhi, Azerbaijan
Died	April 21, 1938(1938-04-21) (aged 50) Baku, Azerbaijan
Occupation(s)	Revolutionary, political leader
Known for	Founding member of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan; Chairman of Azerbaijani SSR's Central Executive Committee; victim of the Great Terror

Sultan Majid Afandiyev (; ; May 26, 1887 – April 21, 1938) was an influential Azerbaijani revolutionary figure and political leader, recognized as a founding member of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan. He became a victim of repression during the Great Terror.

Early years

Afandiyev was born in Shamakhi, present-day Azerbaijan, into a merchant family. Following the collapse of his father's business after the 1902 Shamakhi earthquake, he moved to Baku.

While studying at a six-year educational institution in Baku, Afandiyev was introduced to Marxist ideology. Beginning his involvement in the revolutionary movement within Azerbaijan, then part of the Russian Empire, in 1902, he joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party by 1904. His activism led to early surveillance by tsarist authorities.

In 1904, he contributed to establishing the Hummet, aimed at mobilizing Muslim laborers within the social democratic cause. Afandiyev took on multiple roles including agitator, propagandist, organizer, and contributor to newspapers, producing Turkic-language materials and underground publications.

He was instrumental in the 1904 general strike among Baku workers, serving as a delegate during talks with oil industry leaders that resulted in the pioneering collective agreement known as the "fuel oil constitution," which enhanced wages and workplace conditions.

During the Russian Revolution of 1905, Afandiyev earned recognition as a publicist and supported the 1906 textile workers' strike at Zeynalabdin Taghiyev's enterprise, assisting in obtaining concessions from factory authorities.

Subsequently, he pursued medical studies at Kazan State University, where he was detained for participating in student protests. After completing his medical degree in 1915, Afandiyev served at a cholera observation station ("cholera barracks") in Vasilsursk, Nizhny Novgorod Governorate, before being reassigned to Vladimirovka.

Soviet career

Following the February Revolution of 1917, Afandiyev became active in several organizations including the Baku Council, Hummet Committee, and the Bolshevik faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. During the Civil War, he took part in defending Astrakhan.

Between 1918 and 1931, Afandiyev occupied numerous significant positions: Commissar for Muslim Affairs within the Transcaucasus under the Narkomnats of the RSFSR; deputy chairman of the Central Bureau of the Congress of the Peoples of the East; executive committee member of Baku Council; Extraordinary Commissioner for the Central Committee of the Azerbaijan Communist Party ("AKP"); Commissar of Ganja Province where he led efforts to quell an anti-Bolshevik uprising; member of the Central Executive Committee; People's Commissar of Lands; People's Commissar of Revolutionary Commissariat of the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic ("ASSR"); member of both Central Committee and Transcaucasian Regional Committee of VKP(b); Bureau member of AKP's Central Committee; Deputy Chairman—and from 1931 Chairman—of Azerbaijani SSR's Central Executive Committee; and one of the chairpersons of the Central Executive Committee for the Transcaucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic.

Arrest and execution

During the 22nd Baku Party Conference held in May 1937, Afandiyev faced allegations of sheltering adversaries of Soviet authority. The conference's resolution mandated an inquiry into Afandiyev, Hamid Sultanov, and several others. On June 5, at the 13th Congress of the AKP, Afandiyev refuted these accusations. Nevertheless, Mir Jafar Baghirov, serving as the first secretary of the AKP Central Committee, alongside Yuvelian Sumbatov-Topuridze, the ASSR's minister of internal affairs, exerted pressure on him to admit to anti-Soviet conduct.

Baghirov charged Afandiyev with dispatching supposed relatives to Moscow carrying denunciations against the AKP leadership and referenced Afandiyev’s 1924 mention of Mahammad Amin Rasulzade, condemning it as "Trotskyist rhetoric." Other participants supported these claims; for instance, Council Chairman Huseyn Rahmanov criticized Afandiyev for referring to Rasulzade as his comrade, labeling this a counter-revolutionary offense.

On June 24, Afandiyev was detained by the NKVD. Despite harsh physical abuse intended to force confessions—as attested by witnesses including prison warden D. P. Voznichuk and former NKVD agent V. M. Dudiyev—he initially resisted providing false statements. Under coercion, on August 16, 1937, he consented to testify regarding his alleged participation in a nationalist counter-revolutionary group but later withdrew this admission during his trial.

The Military Collegium of the Supreme Court sentenced Afandiyev to death on April 21, 1938; he was executed in Baku on that very day.

Rehabilitation

On November 23, 1955, USSR Prosecutor General Roman Rudenko proposed Afandiyev’s rehabilitation to the CPSU Central Committee. This recommendation was approved by the Presidium on November 30, leading to Afandiyev’s official exoneration in 1956.

After the 1954 execution of Lavrentiy Beria, Baghirov lost his principal protector and was subsequently prosecuted for his role in the deaths of Afandiyev and other prominent communists during the Great Purge. In April 1956, the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court declared that Afandiyev and other Soviet Azerbaijani officials had been unjustly arrested "under Baghirov’s criminal directives." The court also found Agasalim Atakishiyev guilty of fabricating interrogation documents connected to Afandiyev’s case.

References

• Caucasian Knot : Persons : Efendiev, Sultan Medjid at eng.kavkaz.memo.ru

Further reading

• Bibliography of the Russian Revolution and Civil War
• Bibliography of Stalinism and the Soviet Union