to lose their influence in the ruling elite, especially after he changed the federal capital of Karachi to Islamabad. Ayub slowly began to pull non-muhajirs into the mainstream areas of the economy and politics, coupled with completely ousting Muhajirs from the ruling elite. This caused the Muhajirs' to agitate against the Ayub dictatorship from the early 1960s onwards. The relation was further detoriated when the quota system, revived and expanded by the 1962 constitution, increased the number of seats in professional colleges for students from backward areas which was anathema to the middle-class literate Muhajirs. The percentage of Muhajirs in the civil service declined while the percentage of non-muhajirs increased. In the presidential election of 1965, the Muslim League split into two factions: the Muslim League (Fatima Jinnah) supported Fatima Jinnah, the younger sister of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, while the Convention Muslim League was supported General Ayub Khan. The Muhajirs had supported the Muslim League before the independence of Pakistan in 1947 and now supported the Muslim League of Fatima Jinnah, and this loyalty to Fatima Jinnah led to muhajirs being threatened and abused by Ayub Khan. The rivalry reached a peak after the electoral fraud of the 1965 presidential election and a post-election triumphal march by Gohar Ayub Khan, the son of General Ayub Khan, set off ethnic clashes between Pashtuns and Muhajirs in Karachi on 4 January 1965. Four years later, on 24 March 1969, President Ayub Khan directed a letter to General Yahya Khan, inviting him to deal with the tense political situation in Pakistan. On 26 March 1969, General Yahya appeared on national television and proclaimed martial law over the country. Yahya subsequently abrogated the 1962 Constitution, dissolved parliament, and dismissed President Ayub's civilian officials. 1970–1977 The 1970 Pakistani general election on 7 December 1970, saw the Awami League winning the elections. The Muhajirs had voted for the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan and Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan, this popular support for these parties resulted in ethnic muhajirs winning all six NA seats of Karachi and Hyderabad and 18 PA seats in Karachi and Hyderabad. Muhajirs had decisively lost their place in the ruling elite, but they were still an economic force to be reckoned with (especially in urban Sindh). When Zulfikar Ali Bhutto became the country's head of state in December 1971, the Muhajirs feared that they would be further sidelined, this time by the economic and political resurgence of