Background
Yunus was born on 26 June 1916 in the city of Abbottabad, North-West Frontier Province, to Haji Ghulam Samdani and Murvari January He studied at Muslim University School, Aligarh and Islamia College, Peshawar.
Yunus was born on 26 June 1916 in the city of Abbottabad, North-West Frontier Province, to Haji Ghulam Samdani and Murvari January He studied at Muslim University School, Aligarh and Islamia College, Peshawar.
He served as ambassador to Turkey, Indonesia, Iraq, and Spain. He promoted trade between India and the rest of the world through regular trade fairs and the establishment of exhibition complex at Pragati Maidan in Delhi. He also headed erstwhile Trade Fair Authority of India (TFAI) which is now rechristened as India Trade Promotion Organization.
He died at the age of 84 on 17 June 2001 at the All India Institute Of Medical Sciences, New Delhi after a protracted illness, surrounded by family and friends.
He was imprisoned during the Quit India Movement by Iskandar Mirza in 1941. In Abbottabad Prison he contracted tuberculosis and was subsequently released in 1944, as the government did not think he would survive.
After recuperating, he was again jailed in Kashmir in 1946. He joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1947.
During his time with the Institute for Fiscal Studies, he represented India at the Non-Aligned Summits at Lusaka, Algiers, Colombo, New Delhi, and Harare.
Yunus retired as Secretary to the Ministry of Commerce in 1974. In 1975 he was appointed as special envoy of the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. In this capacity he established the Pragati Maidan in Delhi and went on regular trade exhibitions around the globe to promote Indian products and companies.
He was nominated to the Rajya Sabha in June 1989.
During the Emergency of 1975-1977, Yunus was in the inner circle of Indira Gandhi that used the emergency to settle personal scores or enrich themselves. Yunus had Mark Tully, British Broadcasting Corporation"s New Delhi correspondent arrested and deported.
While giving orders for the arrest of Tully, Yunus was reported to have said "Pull down his pants and give him a few lashes and put him in jail". In August 1981, after Shahryar failed in an attempt to bomb a ship to collect insurance, he was arrested by the United States authorities, convicted by the courts and imprisoned in United States of America. In 1985, on the day the Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi visited United States of America, President Ronald Reagan granted Shahryar clemency. died in 1990.
Quotations: "Pull down his pants and give him a few lashes and put him in jail".