Little Punjab in Sindh: Cluster of prosperous ‘chaks’ amidst poor ‘goths’

KARACHI/ SANGHAR: In the heart of rural Sindh, there is a shining sliver of Punjab – well-planned villages, known as chaks, surrounded by fertile lands and dotted with turban-wearing men tilling the soil.

Once in the area, it is easy to forget that one is in Sanghar district, an area otherwise deprived of most basic facilities.

Retired armed forces personnel, especially those who served in the British Indian Army before partition, live in the area that initially belonged to people associated with the Hur movement. Its most popular resident, however, was a young boy named Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, who would go on to become the prime minister of Pakistan.

Chaks versus goths

Though villages in Sindh are called ‘goths,’ more than 200 villages in Sanjhoro and Sanghar tehsils are known as ‘chaks’ – a term used for villages in Punjab. The difference is not just in the name.

The Majority of the goths, where locals have been living for centuries, are deprived of roads, schools, healthcare, water and sanitation and other basic facilities. The chaks, however, boast most, if not all of them.

“The chaks were developed under the supervision of the military, which provided all kinds of machinery to retired personnel to develop the infrastructure,” said Mir Muhammad Nizamani, a researcher who also heads the Hur Historical Society. “No one has bothered to help the people living in goths,” he added.

Each chak comprises around 80 blocks spread over 1,300 acres of land. Depending on the location, the value of each acre ranges between Rs0.5 and Rs1 million.  The first chak starts around three kilometres from Sanghar town, and it takes a three to four-hour-long drive to cover all 200 chaks.

“The majority of the land belonged to people associated with the Hur Movement who fought against the British rule,” Nizamani said.

“The rest of the land was reclaimed from natural wetlands and Makhi forest, which served as a hideout for Hurs, the followers of Pir Pagara, after they were declared ‘terrorists’ by the British government,” he added.

Soon after the Sindh Assembly passed the Hur Act in 1942, proclaiming that people belonging to the Hur Movement are terrorists, the British government ordered confiscation of their land and properties, and allotted the same to military men, Nizamani added.

His claims were seconded by Allahwarayo Behan, also a historian.

The British government reclaimed the Makhi forest to wipe out the Hur movement and allotted the land to military personnel who fought against the British rule, Behan said. “The practice goes on,” he said, adding that according to revenue records, around 0.2 million acres have been allotted to military personnel in Sanghar district.

As loyal as the locals

Residents of the chaks are aware of the disparity with surrounding goths, and the ensuing resentment.

Among them is the family of Shahid Razzaque, which originally belonged to Jhelum in Punjab, but moved to the area in 1948. Razzaque’s grandfather worked in the British Indian Army as a junior commissioned officer and, upon his retirement, was allotted 40 acres of land in the area.

“My father was born in this area and we have grown up and adopted this culture,” Razzaque said, adding that their relatives in Punjab call them Sindhis, while the majority of locals in Sanghar dislike them, and call them ‘settlers.’

“We are as loyal to Sindh as other locals,” he said, adding that majority of the people in the area are still serving in the armed forces on the Sindh quota.

Most notable resident

Among notable personalities of the area is Prime Minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, who received his primary and secondary education at Sanghar High School before joining Sindh University, Jamshoro, in 1970. The premier’s family later moved to Gujjar Khan, an industrial town in Rawalpindi district.

Ashraf’s teacher, Wali Muhammad, still lives in the area. He recalled that the premier’s father, who lived in Chak No 11, brought both his sons to the government high school in Sanghar in the 1960s.

“I used to teach students in Urdu medium; the headmaster of our school handed over Pervaiz Ashraf and his brother Changaiz to me. I taught both for about five years till matric,” said Muhammad, now a retired District Education Officer, while talking to The Express Tribune.

The brothers would come to the school on either a bicycle or a horse cart, he said.

“They belonged to a Potohari-speaking, middle class family with a military background; that’s why they had acquired around 30 acres of land in Sanghar,” he added.

Muhammad said he used to visit their chak and found Ashraf, several times, working on the land with his family members.

“The family moved to Punjab, but Changaiz Ashraf still visits the area,” he said.

Muhammad added that it was easy to approach the premier till he was the federal minister for water and power but it is impossible now.