Although Isfandir Khan was officially the last Khan of Khiva, technically he had two successors. After Isfandir's assassination, the wily Junaid arranged for Said Abdullah, Isfandir's elderly uncle, to gain the throne. However, the bewildered Said Abdullah was a mere puppet Khan, while Junaid ruled in reality. The Nationalists and Bolsheviks overthrew Khiva once more, and Said Abdullah abdicated. He paid heavily for his brief spell as a pseudo-Khan, and ended his days inauspiciously in a Moscow prison hospital.
Meanwhile, Junaid once more wrested control of Khiva and this time proclaimed himself Khan. However, this was also short-lived, and when overrun once more by the opposition, he fled with his troops to Persia.

Once the Bolsheviks were firmly in control, the surviving aristocracy, particularly Isfandir's children, recognised how dangerous their position was, and either fled to the Ukraine, were shot, or accepted a new and rather demoted proletariat existence. In the Ukraine the relatives of Feruz and Isfandir wisely kept their heritage under wraps and were, to most Ukrainian acquaintances, merely a few of the many Soviet citizens reshuffled or deported around the Union.

In 1990, during the peristroika years, the family were given permission to return to Khiva for a visit, no longer deemed a threat to stability in the region. Feruz Khan's grandchildren, now in their seventies, returned with their own children and grandchildren. They toured their grandfather's kingdom, now a museum site for tourists. The younger generations wore mini-skirts and Ukrainian fashion, staring at the women in head scarves. They were unable to speak or understand Uzbek and had little in common with those around them. Marvelling at this alien world that had once belonged to their great-grandfather, they began to realise just how different their lives might have been.

Theodore Levin, an American musicologist, was visiting Khiva at the time of the Khan's grandchildren's visit, and found himself unexpectedly sitting next to royalty.

'"Hello, my name is Levin," I said to my neighbour.
"Good evening," the man replied. "I am Madyarov, Abdurasul Madyarovich. My grandfather was Feruz, the Khan of Khiva."
I put my fork down, took a deep breath, and looked intently at Madyarov (whose erstwhile title was Abdurasul Tora - Prince Abdurasul). He stared back at me... His face was lined, but the skin held tightly against his cheekbones.
..."This is my first visit to Khiva in seventy-one years," Madyarov yelled above the music... I asked him whether he knew Uzbek. "How could I know Uzbek?" he exclaimed with annoyance. "I was sent away from Khiva when I was eighteen years old. I've lived all my life in the Ukraine. I haven't spoken Uzbek for seventy years, and I've forgotten every word I ever knew."'

To be precise, Madyarov had been sent away from Khiva on 12 July 1920, when the Bolshevik 'Commission for the Affairs of Turkestan under the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the Congress of Soviets and the Council of People's Commissars' decided to get rid of the Khan and his family.
With seven other members of the Khan's family, he was put on a train and taken to Lubyanka Prison Number Two in Moscow, where he spent 20 days. The Khan died shortly afterwards in a prison hospital.

Between 1920 and 1923, Madyarov was incarcerated in a series of monasteries which had been turned into concentration camps. Finally released, he was forbidden to return to Khiva. He worked as a guard and at other menial jobs, married, and had three children. Then in 1990, through a casual dinner-table conversation at a Ukrainian spa where he was vacationing, Madyarov had made the acquaintance of a wealthy man from Khiva, who, on hearing his identity, promised to send him a ticket to visit Khiva for Navruz.

'"How did you find it after seventy-one years?"
"The air's good, I feel at home. I kissed the earth when I got off the airplane, and I visited my parents' graves."'

Theodore Levin 'The Hundred Thousand Fools of God' 1996