Salih Nijazi was born on 5 March 1876 in Starja, a village in the Kolonja region of southeastern Albania, which was then in the Ottoman Empire.

He received a Bektashi education at the pir evi of Haji Bektash Veli in Hacıbektaş (Hacıbektaşköy), central Turkey.

[2] In 1916, Salih Nijazi was appointed Dedebaba (kryegjysh) of the Bektashi Order, succeeding Fejzi Dede.

[2] In 1930, [2][3] Salih Nijazi established the World Headquarters of the Bektashi movement (Albanian: Kryegjyshata) in Tirana.

[2] In Albania, he introduced major Bektashi ceremonies that were traditionally held at well-known tekkes in places such as Hacıbektaş in central Turkey, Dimetoka (Didymoteicho) in Thrace (Greece), Karbala in Iraq, and also Göztepe, Kadıköy in Istanbul.