Lies and half-truths on Balochistan

The Baloch must realise the irony of fighting for their rights while living in a stultifying tribal system.


Ejaz Haider November 05, 2010
Lies and half-truths on Balochistan

The situation in Balochistan is throwing up lies and half-truths. While partisans can’t be trusted with truth, what about some so-called libs whose favourite pastime is to find fault with the state without offering viable policy solutions?

Let me put it up front: Balochistan needs to be healed — within Pakistan’s federal framework. Those who want freedom by resorting to violence and through the support of hostile elements have no place in any negotiating process unless they lay down arms. Let us also flag the point that the issue is about Balochistan’s grievances, not just Baloch grievances. Lest anyone forget, Balochistan houses other ethnic groups too.

There is deep irony in the fact that the Baloch sub-nationalists who don’t tire of talking about their rights have shied from fighting the internal battle for more egalitarian social structures which could have freed them from the debilitating influence of the sardari system. It is that system, also exploited by successive governments, which has kept Baloch areas undeveloped.

Look at the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), led by Hyrbiar Marri, son of Khair Bakhsh Marri. Educated, like most scions of the sardars (while the common Baloch remains pathetically uneducated), he is based in London. It was his group that took responsibility, among other terrorist acts, for killing the innocent Punjabi labourers.

Next is the Balochistan Republican Army (BRA). Not a nice bra this one. It is led by Brahmdagh Bugti, grandson of Akbar Bugti, whose district Dera Bugti, according to the Human Development Index, is the worst in Pakistan, even though the late Akbar Bugti served at various times as the interior minister of Pakistan and chief minister and governor of Balochistan. While BRA fights for the liberation of Balochistan, presumably on the basis of Baloch rights, Dera Bugti lives in the 12th century. The Bugti patriarch was not prepared to grant equal rights even to other Bugtis.

Then we have the Baloch Liberation United Front. This group killed four Punjabi businessmen and kidnapped John Solecki.

The fourth is the Balochistan Liberation Front of Dr Allah Nazar Baloch, the only group which comprises middle-class professionals. It also draws its cadres from the Balochistan Student Organisation (Azad) and mainly operates in the Makran belt and central Balochistan.

The fifth is Lashkar-e Balochistan, which is the militant face of Akhtar Mengal’s Balochistan National Party (M) and operates in the Khuzdar area. The slain Habib Jalib Baloch was the secretary general of BNP (M).

The sixth group, Baloch Musalla Dafa Tanzeem, is led by Ataur Rehman Mengal, son of former state minister Naseer Mengal, and also operates in Khuzdar. In the murky waters of Balochistan, this is likely the establishment’s response to Baloch militancy. Most of these groups draw people along tribal lines; there’s no united leadership and they continue to fight among themselves.

Balochistan in general and the Baloch in particular need to get their rights. But negotiations must be within the federal framework. Equally, the Baloch must realise the irony of fighting for their rights while living in a stultifying tribal system. Many want their children to be educated. There are cases of fighters secretly sending their boys to enroll in the army-funded education programme. They must not be disappointed.

So backward is the ordinary Baloch that the Baloch demand recruitment quota even in private organisations. A Pashtun from Pishin cannot get into the Bolan Medical College despite high marks while a Baloch with very low marks can secure a seat because of the quota system. This needs to change.

Finally, for those who think the Hazara community is living in great peace in Quetta or that the Punjabis are not leaving: visit Quetta and meet both communities. Since 2002, the Hazara community has suffered more than 1,200 casualties in various sectarian attacks and target killings. And try telling the Punjabis their numbers are swelling rather than depleting. You better be a good runner!

Published in The Express Tribune November 6th, 2010.

COMMENTS (41)

indigenous | 13 years ago | Reply '....we need to be suspicious when neat cultural icons are plastered over messier historical and political narratives, so we need to be wary when Lord Cromer in British-ruled Egypt, French ladies in Algeria, and Laura Bush, all with military troops behind them, claim to be saving or liberating Muslim women." (leila Abu Lughod) Add to this list the above writer and it's imperialist army which he represents and teach.
Narejo | 13 years ago | Reply @MALIK SIRAJ AKBAR, if you learn one thing from the program you are enrolled in the U.S., it is that one must NEVER jump to conclusions. Your ethnocentrism is most glaringly at display when you ask "Punjabis praded Mukhtaran Mai naked, does that provide the Balochs a chance to grab your rice farms?" I am not a Punjabi so I find that a little ridiculous question; for all I care you could perfectly grab my rice farms since I have none. By the way I think I should remind you that no one suggested invading any one's land on the pretext of human rights violation so your analogy is moot. The questions I posed--and I certainly intended no offence--stemmed out of the dichotomy I observe between claims of Baloch secularism and struggle for human rights on the one hand and the discrimination against the Baloch women as well as the Baloch denizens of the assorted deras under not-so-impoverished Baloch sardars on the other. And before you get so worked up, remember that not everyone who is critical is an ill-wisher or a Punjabi. I hold my Baloch sisters and brothers in a very high esteem and I have nothing against them. Unfortunately, it is the erroneous assumptions and paranoia, as reflected by the question I quoted, very slightly but eerily echoes the paranoia of BLA and other thugs, who in their blind ethnic chauvinism, are killing, without much condemnation in the media or otherwise, poor innocent ( Punjabi) laborers/ teachers of other ethnic groups in Balochistan. :
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