Land dispute: Rivals step down as cooler heads prevail

The DPO informed that after two days of hectic efforts, the tribesmen agreed.

TORGHAR:

A tribal jirga and officials of the local administration claimed to have averted impending bloodshed between rival tribes over a six-month-old land dispute in a remote village of Torghar district.

According to officials and villagers, the Syed and non-Syed members of the Basikhel tribe from Mohri, Jatka and Shatil villages of district headquarters Judba were in disagreement over the ownership of about 100 kanals of forest land.

Both sides have been collecting firewood from the area for several decades but the non-Syed Basikhels claimed around six months ago that the land belonged to their ancestors and thus the Syeds have no right to collect firewood or cultivate the arable land.

Following the objection, armed men from both sides took up positions in their respective areas.

According to police officials and villagers of the area, the two sides did not allow each other’s men to even step in the disputed territory and resorted to aerial firing in case of any transgression.

“The situation had reached alarming proportions as it could have led to an all-out war between the two tribes,” claimed DPO Iftikharuddin Khan while talking to The Express Tribune on Friday.

He said District Commissioner Sanaullah and himself called a jirga of the Nusrat Khel tribe and assigned them the task of brokering a ceasefire between the two parties.

The DPO informed that after two days of hectic efforts, the rival tribesmen agreed to maintain a ceasefire till December 31 this year during which the jirga would meet to discuss ownership rights of both parties and then decide the matter.

Earlier this month, the Nusrat Khel and Akazai tribes had a similar dispute in Kandar tehsil which was also resolved after a jirga’s intervention. 

Published in The Express Tribune, May 31^st, 2014.