Ibrohimbek Chaqaboev was an ethnic Uzbek, born in the kishlak (village) of Kok-Tash of Lokai-Tajik region (located to the south-west of Dushanbe) into the family of a Bukharian official.

He worked as a tax collector. In 1920, he became the bek [a title of the landowner] and joined the army of the Emir of Bukhara Seyid Alim Khan. After the proclamation of the Bukharan People’s Soviet Republic (in October 1920), he arrived in Dushanbe to organize a new government and the army. In September 1920, the emir fled to Eastern Bukhara, and in 1921, moved to Afghanistan. Ibrohimbek led the Basmachi’s armed struggle for the restoration of Emir’s power in the territory of Eastern Bukhara. He commanded over 4,000 people. After reestablishing the authority in Central and Southern Tajikistan, in the autumn of 1921 he attempted several sieges of Dushanbe.

In 1922, he became the kurbashi (senior commander) of the Lokai armed groups in the fight against the troops of Enver Pasha (a Turkish military and political leader, a leader of the Young Turks, who took part in the anti-Soviet Basmachi movement in 1921). After the death of Enver Pasha on August 4, 1922, Ibrohimbek became the main leader of the Basmachi, who came from the former Bukhara Emirate.

In the autumn of 1922, the Red Army was fighting in Eastern Bukhara against the new Alim Khan’s protégé, a Turkish officer and an English agent, Salim Pasha (real name Khoja Salim-bey).

At the end of May 1923, Salim Pasha and Ibrohimbek struggled for leadership in the Basmachi movement, which resulted in Ibrohimbek’s defeat. In 1924–1925, he reorganized his detachments and took command of the campaign to the territory of Eastern Bukhara. In June 1926, Ibrohimbek’s detachment was defeated, and he himself hid in Afghanistan.

After this, Ibrohimbek’s forces of 2-3 thousand basmachis repeatedly crossed the border and robbed the soviet kishlaks (villages), murdering the activists.

In 1928, Ibrohimbek came into conflict with Afghanistan authorities. In 1929, in Afghanistan, he fought against the forces of the Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army. He tried to unite under his command all the Basmachi forces of Iran and Afghanistan. According to Soviet intelligence, he intended to found an independent Uzbek-Tajik state under Alim Khan. He made repeated attempts to invade the territory of the USSR.

On June 23, 1931, he was taken prisoner by the Special division of the All-Union State Political Administration (OGPU). On August 31, 1931, Ibrohimbek was sentenced to capital punishment and shot in Tashkent.