G-B to continue Shandur festival

Teams will stay away till federal govt resolves boundary issue with K-P.

GILGIT: Chief Minister Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B) Mehdi Shah on Friday vowed to continue a boycott of the famous Shandur Polo tournament unless the federal government resolves the controversial boundary issue between G-B and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P).

“Our boycott of the tournament continues as long as the issue stands unresolved,” Mehdi Shah told legislators in the Gilgit-Baltistan assembly during proceedings on Friday. He said that Shandur is part of G-B, a claim that is also held by K-P for the past some decades.

The event played between Chitral and Gilgit-Baltistan teams dates back to colonial times when Major Evelyn Cobb, a British Political Agent in the 1930s, initiated it in the Shandur ground that is said to be the world’s highest polo ground.

The Shandur boundary issue marred the internationally acclaimed free style polo tournament last year as the teams of Gilgit-Baltistan boycotted in compliance with the political government’s decision. Shah said that boycott is meant to register G-B’s protest over the K-P government’s continued “encroachment over G-B land”.

In 2010, some teams of Chitral played the tournament in Shandur despite the boycott.

Speaker Gilgit-Baltistan Assembly Wazir Baig asked the government to form a committee comprising members of the G-B Council and G-B Assembly to settle the issue of boundaries.

The committee should hold negotiations with the K-P government as well as the federal government to ensure that boundaries are clearly demarcated.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 5^th, 2011.