War of the drones?

ed note- this is part of a two part series discussing opposite views on the recent Drone report 

by Ali

The recent report on drone attacks by Pakistani and non-Pakistani students of Stanford University and New York University raised more questions instead of answering them .

For instance, the report states the narrative that drone attacks are effective is wrong and they have no legal basis. Despite this premise it talks of psychological effects of drone victims.  While this is a valid concern, how does it fall in the purview of legal studies? For every one person killed in drones 15-16 Pakistani citizens, soldiers and policemen have been killed in indiscriminate suicide bombings and terrorist attacks by the nexus of Jihadist groups that have taken over North Waziristan.

The drones target these Jihadist militants that are supported and protected by elements within the State.

Who bears greater responsibility?

Is it just the drone attacks or those cowardly Jihadist militants that use women and children as civilian shields? Like a previous 2009 study, this study also obscures the role of the drone victims drawing stringent categories such as “major Al Qaeda leaders”.

Like the 2009 study, this stringent category probably does not include mass murdering Jihadists like Baitullah Meshud.  Along with issuing death threats to Shaheed Benazir Bhutto which eventually resulted in her assassination along with hundreds of PPP activists in an earlier blast. Baitullah’s TTP has boastfully taken credit for other attacks.  They have owned up to killing thousands of innocent Pakistani civilians.

But the report attempts to exclude him just as it ignores that a significant percentage of the 2700-3200 victims of drone attacks are foreign militants and are not even Pakistani citizens.  They include transnational Jihadist from China, Chechnya, Uzbekistan, Saudis, Jordanians, Egyptians, Libyans and even Britishers and Germans.  Similarly, the various Jihadist and sectarian groups from Punjab and other parts of Pakistan ( the so called 'Punjabi Taliban') that are also based in this area and allied to Al Qaeda and TTP are excluded!

And this leads us to the most fundamental flaw in this report which is its basic methodology.  As per many sources and indications within the report itself, the drone victim relatives were interviewed in Peshawar and even Islamabad. This opens up the study to criticisms:

• Is this report limited to only those drone strikes that caused the highest civilian casualties?
• Does it include other drone strikes where civilian casualties were minimal or zero?

This is a sampling technique that highlights a clear bias and also casts doubts on the veracity of the interviews.

picture via statesman peshawar

The report also conveniently excludes crucial facts that only the militants and their minders in North Waziristan have access to that area.  As pointed out on more than one occasion by academics and activists like Farhat Taj, the areas being targeted by drone strikes are not controlled by the Pakistani government. They are controlled by the nexus of the Taliban, Al Qaeda and their Jihadi affiliates like LeJ/ASWJ/JM etc. This is why it has been virtually impossible to determine the exact number of civilian casualties. This leads to other criticism of the study:

• Did the respondents interview the 46,000 (and increasing every day ) victims of Jihadist terrorism in Pakistan about the psychological effects of seeing their near and dear one killed across the country?
• Did it ask the 15-20% of the country’s population which is Shia about the psychological effects of seeing gruesome beheading and executions of pilgrims and laborers on the basis of their religious identity.
• Similarly, did the respondents speak to the countless Pashtun families as well as PPP, ANP, JUI-F, other political activists and even those Deobandi clerics who were massacred for opposing the Taliban and their methods?

• Did the respondents speak to the Sufi adherents of Rehman Baba, Abdullah Shah Ghazi, Jhal Magsi, Bari Imam and Data Darbar who all witnessed death and destruction caused by those who use human shields when hiding drone attacks?

• It ignores the fact that it is in the interests of Jihadist groups to exaggerate civilian casualties for a variety of reasons.  It is vital for maintaining the morale of the Jihadists by refuting actual casualties within their ranks. Similarly, exaggerating civilians casualties is a valuable recruitment tool.  

Who are behind the Foundation for Fundamental Rights and why is their 'Rights agenda' selectively restricted to 3000 drone victims?

• What is their moral calculus and the political affiliation of the Pakistani's involved in the research? Have they declared any potential conflicts of interest?
• What is their link with Imran Khan who recently endorsed Sheikh Rashid’s acceptance of Mullah Omar as 'The Leader'?
• Is this report a promotion tool for Imran Khan’s anti-drone rally to North Waziristan?

It would be instructive to read what writer Asad Munir ( Imran Khan’s march to Waziristan Published: September 28, 2012) has written  on this topic:

There is no dispute over the fact that drones are violating our sovereignty. The difference in opinion is about the effects and collateral damage caused by these strikes. A large majority of people are of the opinion that these strikes are not helping the counter terrorism effort, are counterproductive and are leading to anger and more violence. Imran khan is of the view that there is a correlation between drone attacks and suicide bombings as such kind of violence started after the first drone strike in 2004. The fact is that there were 413 incidents of violence including 11 suicide bombings before the first drone strike. Terrorist activities have little or no link with drones. In 2009, there were 53 drone attacks and the casualties in the war on terror were 11,704 while in 2010, the number of strikes increased to 117 but the causalities decreased to 7,435.
Drones are violating our sovereignty but so are the foreign militants staying in our country without travel documents and using our soil for terrorist activities. They are the cause for drone attacks. The day they are expelled from our country, in all probability, there will be no drone attack. All kinds of weapons are used in wars; a drone is one of these weapons. Why are Western human right organisations protesting against only drones and not against say, daisy-cutters, artillery, mortars, bombers, IEDs, F-16s and many other weapons that cause more collateral damage than drones? Since the media has no access to drone-affected areas, the casualty figures reported are conflicting, ranging from 2,400 to 3,300. A recent report by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) claims that 474-881 civilians, including 176 children, have been killed. How does the TBIJ differentiate between a civilian, a terrorist or a facilitator when it does not have the lists of names of members of the Haqqani network, Gul Bahadur and thousands of other Taliban, jihadis or the various sectarian groups operating in the area? On the other hand, people present in the area, having information about the terrorist organisations, their members and facilitators, reject claims of high civilian casualties. Except for three strikes, the other 312 have mostly killed terrorists and their facilitators.
The debate on drones cannot afford to be selective.  No killing tactic can be celebrated or cheered for – whether it is the drones or its targets that include mass suicide bombing Jihadists.  Similarly, a proper debate cannot be framed on faulty data, sampling bias or creating a false binary between the targeted and relatively discriminate drone attacks as opposed to the indiscriminate suicide attacks that target civilians on the basis of religious identity or ethnic affiliation. (Source)

In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, tens of thousands of Pashtuns have been massacred by the Taliban and the various transnational Al Qaeda mercenaries in the most gruesome manner.  However, for those who selectively condemn drones, the Pashtun is presented as the “noble savage”.  Their lives only have meaning if they agree to be used as Jihadist auxiliaries along with the rest of other disenfranchised Pakistanis.

- Ali Arqam is a freelance journalist and researcher, he contributes to http://t.co/aCBsq9l and tweets at @aliarqam 

Afzal Bangash: the Marxist maverick

Afzal Bangash: the Marxist maverick

By M. Taqi

“I count myself in nothing else so happy,

As in a soul remembering my good friends” — Shakespeare in Richard II

Reminiscing about some of the stars of the secular galaxy of Pakistan and especially Pakhtunkhwa is needed not just due to a family association or personal, feel-good nostalgia. It is a must because the current generations – being fed a steady diet of Wahabiism – ought to get acquainted with the history of this land.

Where first the state-controlled, and now the state-indoctrinated media persons have systematically relegated both our saints and secularists to oblivion while projecting larger-than-life images of the obscurantist characters from Pakistan Studies and Islamic Studies textbooks, such recollections become an obligation. One such distinguished progressive was the leader of the Mazdoor Kissan Party (MKP), Muhammad Afzal Bangash who died on this day (October 28) in 1986.

In mid-1986, Bangash sahib had returned from exile and was residing at the Kohat Road, Peshawar. The word spread and I got to tag along with friends and family who called upon him. Somehow the conversation started in Urdu. But then Bangash sahib asked “Tussi saray Hindko samajhdeyo na?” (All of you understand Hindko?). Some nodded, others said yes. He then quipped: “Bohat achha aye, kyoonkeh mein Urdu bolna waaN tey inj lagda aye jhoot bol riya waaN” (Great then, because if I speak in Urdu it feels like I am lying).

In one sweep he had thus made a case for the mother tongue; Bangash sahib was not known for subtleties. Twenty-four years later a study by the British Council Pakistan recommended last month that the mother tongue be the medium of instruction in elementary schools.

Afzal Bangash was above any chauvinism or parochialism though. He spoke and wrote in Urdu, Pashto and English and had great command of the Peshawari and Kohati Hindko. He remained part of the Ulasi Adabi Jirgah (People’s Literary Guild) along with the Urdu poets Farigh Bokhari and Raza Hamdani, progressive Pashto poets like Ajmal Khattak and Qalandar Momand and the religio-romantic nationalist masters like Amir Hamza Shinwari and Dost Muhammad Kamil. The guild was founded by his mentor Kaka-ji Sanober Hussain Momand, a revolutionary leader of the Indian freedom movement, after whom Bangash sahib later named the MKP weekly Sanober that also carried Kaka-ji’s verse on its cover.

In fact Bangash sahib detested labels and branding. While many characterised him as a Maoist, he took umbrage at the tag for he was the Marxist maverick who recorded his opposition to the Chinese invasion of Vietnam in the MKP’s journal Circular and parted ways with his colleagues who endorsed the invasion. After the Afghan revolution Hafizullah Amin wanted Bangash sahib to form a Pakistani party allied with his Khalq faction. Not only did he snub Amin but further admonished him for their transgressions and advised them to take the local culture and norms into serious consideration.

A son of the soil, Bangash sahib was not fond of importing or exporting revolutions and believed in an indigenous struggle. He was of the opinion that only the local circumstances can dictate the means to revolutionary ends. To him the most essential tool was revolutionary self-reliance, meaning a combination of the mass mobilisation of the oppressed people through an astute leadership, culminating in the directly concerned people waging the struggle. In an agrarian society this meant that the peasantry was to be the vanguard of such a movement.

But having served as Mohtarma Fatima Jinnah’s provincial campaign manager in her bid against Ayub Khan, in an election rigged by the general, Bangash sahib was acutely aware of the deck stacked against the masses. He had been a member of the Communist Party of Pakistan (CPP) since 1948 and had seen the Quaid-e-Azam watch helplessly as the West Punjab Assembly flouted the recommendations of its own land reform sub-committee within six months of independence. Whether it was fixing the tenant’s share in the crop, the abolition of begaar (unpaid forced labour), making cheap credit available to the tenant or preventing their forced evictions, legislative help was not on the horizon.

Having been elected as the first General Secretary of the National Awami Party (NAP) in 1957, Afzal Bangash was intimately familiar with the workings of such multi-class leftist fronts, where in many instances the feudal nationalist elements held sway over party decisions. One such decision by the NAP leadership barring Bangash sahib and others from working in the peasant committees led to his parting ways with NAP and founding on May 1, 1968, the MKP – perhaps the largest revolutionary leftist party in Pakistan’s history that openly eschewed electoral politics.

The MKP’s red flag with a white star became a symbol of resistance to the feudal lords in Hashtnagar (Charsadda), Peshawar, Mardan and Swat/Malakand. It drew support from not only the tenants and agri-labourers but also from white-collar communities like the lawyers. In fact, Wali Khan’s nephew Faridoon Khan hoisted the MKP flag at his father Ghani Khan’s house and ‘de-classed’ himself to join the peasant uprising. After a tenant, Sardar Shah raised the MKP flag as a challenge against his landlord Usman Ali “Wawa” Khan’s eviction order, the scene was set for a mass uprising in northern Hashtnagar and an armed struggle ensued. The peasant uprising lasted through three successive governments including that of the NAP. Along with its contemporary Naxalite struggle and the Peruvian and Nepalese peasant movements that followed it, the Hashtnagar peasant struggle provides a unique case study in an era when urban fascists pretend to be anti-feudal!

Well-versed in Marxist theory as many of his speeches and writings reflect, Afzal Bangash however, was not a dogmatist. He did develop a methodology of modifying both theory and practice to adjust the ideological framework and the means to achieve political goals. He was proud of his comrades like Major Ishaq Muhammad, Professor Eric Cyprian, Imtiaz Alam and Sher Ali Baacha who contributed immensely to both theory and the practical struggle. During the recent judiciary movement some of his former associates like Latif Afridi and Justice Shahjahan Yousafzai demonstrated, from the bar and the bench respectively, the acumen and resolve of the seasoned campaigners that Bangash sahib had trained by the dozens.

Afzal Bangash did gradually move towards mainstream politics starting with the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy (MRD), of which the MKP was a founding and highly functional component. He had a great working relationship with Shaheed Benazir Bhutto during that era. In 1985 he, along with Ataullah Mengal, Mumtaz Bhutto and Hafiz Pirzada, formed the Sindhi Baloch Pashtun Front, proposing a confederal state to counter the Punjabi establishment’s hegemony.

Upon returning to Pakistan, he remained involved with the merger of the left-oriented parties and closed the door on a generation-long rift with Wali Khan. The MKP, a faction of the PNP, Rasool Paleejo’s Awami Tehrik and the NDP thus came together to form the Awami National Party (ANP). Wali Khan became its first president while MKP’s Sardar Shaukat Ali was elected as its General Secretary.

Bangash sahib’s legacy is that of a secular, selfless devotion to the deliverance of the wretched of the earth from oppression and exploitation, if needed, by challenging through all means available, the Weberian concept of the ‘legitimate monopoly on violence’ as well as the hegemony of the forces of tradition. Having declined high office and judgeships many times, Bangash sahib remained wedded till his last breath to the cause he championed. He was originally buried in his ancestral graveyard in Shadi Khel village, Kohat, but later on his mortal remains were transferred to Hashtnagar where he rests in peace along with his comrades and cadres.

One column cannot do justice to a political life spanning more than four decades but I will say to my younger friends in the words of Iqbal and Hafiz:



“I scatter the petals of tulips upon the dust of martyrs;

For their blood profits the sapling of the community;

Come so that we may strew roses and pour wine into the cup;

Let us tear open the roof of Heaven and think upon new ways.”

The writer can be reached at mazdaki@me.com. He tweets at http://twitter.com/mazdaki

Originally published by the Daily Times Pakistan Thursday, October 28 2010

Picture of the Day: Mahaabat Khan Mosque مهابت خان

Waziristan the ground situation

By Khalid Munir

Soon after conquering Waziristan in 19th century, the British realized that instead of ruler they are prisoners. The subjects were roaming around freely, while British were restricted to camps. Movement was with heavy escorts and had to be guarded by piqueting the route. More than a century on, it seems nothing has changed. At least that is the impression I got during my few days stay at North Waziristan.

pic via CSIS 

Sitting in Islamabad, Kabul and Washington one can not understand what this rugged area means. Just by seeing the area many questions arising about inaction of army are answered. Terrain is mountainous and unlike Kashmir where peaks are mutually defended, it is impossible to resort to that tactics and as a result wide gaps are left between various piquets and posts thus, making it impossible to stop movement across the border. Roads run in valleys surrounded by the mountains making them unsafe to travel unless peaks are properly guarded.


Who controls North Waziristan?. No one. Army has not exerted its power to take complete control of the agency due to justifiable reasons. Taliban are divided between various groups and even their authority is eroding. People ignored the warning given through pamphlets by Hafiz Gul Bahadur, asking locals not to work on road being built by FWO. Anyone claiming control is over estimating his strength.

Army, restricted to camps, is reactive rather than in proactive role. Unless militants attack the troop. camps or check posts, no action is being taken. Movement from on place to another is in heavily armed convoys and that also once a week for administrative requirements. Curfew has to be imposed on roads from Bannu to Miran shah and Mir Ali Razmak Data Khel during movements. Piquets are in place on the whole route to guard the convoys, yet five IEDs exploded during my travel to Miransha, causing casualties. So movement has become a logistical and tactical exercise. Army is not resorting to operations and an uneasy peace prevails. Taliban’s are unidentifiable. Uzbeks and Tajiks have settled down in Dawar areas, mostly around Mir Ali. So are elements of TTP. Miran Shah has become an international city where nationals from all countries are found. Intelligence gathering is difficult because locals fear Taliban reprisal. So it is mostly restricted to electronic eves dropping and intercepts. In such circumstances, differentiating between TTP and those fighting across the border becomes impossible. Peace committee (newly constituted) is in place. That is the major source of liaison between Taliban and the government. Maintaining peace has been left to the peace committee which moderates between Taliban and the political administration. Army reacts in case it is attacked and that too after political administration and the local Jirga agrees on punitive action. Collective punishment is still resorted to but on a much smaller scale.


Political administration has lost the control it once exercised in FATA. With army calling the shots and defiant militants, administration’s key control tool of levies has become redundant. Maliks are no more effective. After their targeted killings since 2006, this tool of administration has been replaced by peace committee which is more under influence of Taliban than the government.

Unlike Islamabad and Lahore, drone attacks are not an issue, as locals do not fear it due to it’s accuracy in hitting the targets. It seems that army and government has also reconciled with drone attacks and if other problems are solved with NATO, drone attacks will not remain an issue irrespective of what APC or parliament say.

Despite all the difficulties North Waziristan has to be cleared of foreigners and TTP. Sufficient forces are not available to carry out any major operation in the agency. The existing force is barely enough to keep the stalemate working. Last year the concept of targeted operation was being considered but any targeted operation will not remain restricted and the fighting will spread to the whole agency and may be to the adjoining South Waziristan which has not been stabilized so far. With return of IDPs, incidents of attacks by militants have increased in South Waziristan. Any major operation in NWA has to be undertaken from South Waziristan and the prevailing situation does not favor such an adventure. In neighboring agencies to the north like Kurram, Orakzai, Tirah in Khyber, the situation is still not under control. The additional troops required will have to be inducted by either thinning out from other area in FATA or fresh troops from other parts of the country will have to be brought in. Without that thinking of even targeted operation is impossible.


Most of the troops are deployed/busy in internal security so insufficient troops are available for border duty. Crossing points logically have to be near main roads/routes but nothing stops Taliban from crossing over from unconventional, undefined routes. Measures like coloring the fertilizers, which now we are following will not be of much help. They do not require containers of fertilizers. It can easily be carried on motor cycles, the favorite means of transport.

With occasional calls from NATO and USA for action against Haqqani network, and keeping our own interest in mind that the area has to be brought under control, we will have to resort to military operation. For the time being it is impossible to do so.




North Waziristan — a first-hand account Published by Express Tribune: April 29, 2012


The writer is a retired army officer who served in Fata and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa

Art of the day

By S. EsapZai

- 
S. EsapZai is an ethnic Pashtun female residing in Canada.
She is currently pursuing her Ph.D., focusing on gender and economic development of rural Pashtun women.
She is also an artist of sorts. Her love for art started at the tender age of four –
a natural talent that emanated without ever having taken any formal art classes.
Growing up, she was often dubbed as the “little artist” by her peers. Back then drawing and painting was merely a
However, art for her now is a part-time profession, where she hopes to raise more awareness about Pashtuns through her artwork.
Her passion for art can be summed up in the following quote:
"Creating art is like being in love. You and the work become one. You cannot pretend, nor fake it.
There are no rules or formula to follow. You can’t plan it, nor can you control it.
And you don’t formulate it in your head and make it so. It just simply is.” – Unknown

For more information about her artwork, visit her online portfolio
at the following website: http://www.artifolio.com/Sesapzai/gallery/.
She also blogs at http://sesapzai.wordpress.com/ and tweets @Sesapzai

Garrison province

By AP

The Insecurity in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa ...

They are murdered, tied up in sacks and dumped in Peshawar, Nowshera or Charsadda. Over the last one month, 30 such dead bodies have been found. The police say they do not know the killers. I doubt if they want to know either. The Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa police and by extension the provincial government choose not to speak when the very powerful secret service agencies might be involved. However when the recent wave of murders became too intense, the Peshawar High Court had to take notice. Ironically, the gunny-bag murders became even more frequent as if in defiance.

Swat-Two other militants die in the Armys custody in Swat
14/09/2012 07:13

The High Court was also forced to take suo motu action on another equally shocking chain of dead bodies coming out of jails run by Pakistan Army in Swat. According to one report 128 people have died in Pakistan Army custody in Swat. The reason given for every death every time is preposterous: ‘The prisoner died of illness’. Equally upsetting is the fact that none of those bodies were given post mortem inspection.

Meanwhile, we have witnessed two major bomb attacks (in Mattani and University Town) in Peshawar which killed and injured dozens and traumatized hundreds of families. A visit to a psychiatric clinic in Peshawar revealed the most senior doctor there has patients lined up for the next two months. In the meantime the bombing of schools in Swabi, Shabqadar and Peshawar has become a daily news item. One has noticed that people are expressing much less shock over the bombing of schools than they used to perhaps due to the sheer frequency of these attacks now. All this is happening when the Pakistan Army already controls the security policy of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, even inside the urban centres. The cantonment areas especially in Peshawar, Kohat and Bannu are largely inaccessible to the public. While throughout the rest of KP (Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa) province, people are frequently subjected to delays and questioning at checkposts. Travelling south on the National Highway you are stopped at least half a dozen times before reaching Peshawar from Bannu. In KP ‘the man of the house’ is the soldier, all traffic must stop when a convoy of the forces passes. I remember one biker shouting to me in response to my surprise at the aggressive behavior of soldiers with the public in Bannu, ‘You have to listen when the Army tells you to stop’. When I saw a convoy of the armed forces driving too fast through a busy market area in Hangu, a man told me, ‘That’s what they do’.

It is not just in Miranshah that the markets close before the evening call for prayers. It is the same in towns of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Insecurity is a fact of life for the average person and most people in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa do not have the luxury of staying out late like you still can in the rest of the country.

The Pakistan Army operation in Swat has been touted as a success on the national and international levels. Keeping aside questions regarding Pakistan Army’s motives behind allowing the Taliban takeover of Swat first and then taking action, the Army has been running the city of Swat like they run a cantonment since the ‘conquest’ of the tourist resort. May I point out that the Pakistan Army already holds strong presence in Abbottabad, another tourist destination in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. But despite all its control over this province, has the Pakistan Army stopped the militants from attacking us? Have the intelligence agencies been effective in thwarting deadly bomb attacks like the ones in a market in Mattani and Kohat Bus Stand? The answer is a lurid red ‘negative'. With respect to security, we need to point out that like the Pakistan People’s Party on the national level, the Pashtun ANP (Awami National Party) has given away administrative authority in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa too easily to the military interest group within Pakistan. The party has failed to rein in or at the least direct the security forces according to its own inherited vision of the future for Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and the local understanding of Pashtun security issues.

We need to tell the ANP-led government to ‘wake up and inspect the blood stains’ but forensics is where its biggest weakness lies. The police department is not only underequipped but remains severely understaffed. The city of Peshawar provides only 1 police officer for every 520 people with Lahore doing the same for every 291. The ‘police-to-population ratio’ in Lahore of course is not a ratio to aspire to because that too is too imbalanced. In the violence-ravaged city of Peshawar the ratio is nowhere near sufficiency. KP police does not have properly trained and sufficient manpower to gather intelligence and conduct investigation. Both areas need tremendous improvement. The competence of the provincial police was seriously questioned all over the world when hundreds of prisoners escaped from the Bannu jail. Also, can we ask the KP police if they have captured a single school bomber so far? Their answer may well be negative because there is a lot of mystery around this issue too. The KP government have not utilized the civilian peace militias to their better capacity as well. Instead it has managed to make the chief of Adezai lashkar Dilawar Khan and his men quit in anger. The Adezai peace force is now split because of lack of support from the province and the result is renewed insurgency in the outskirts of Peshawar. On the judicial front, the provincial government must support the judicial activism of the Peshawar High Court and help spread this wave down to lower levels of the justice system coupled with administrative support.

For Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa to protect itself against the Taliban (and their mysterious backers), it has to become more assertive in regards to Pakistan’s security policy inside the province and at the same time aggressively enhance the capabilities of the police. With no pro-Pakistan government in Afghanistan, the Pakistani establishment is likely to continue interfering in that country’s internal affairs using Pashtun-inhabited areas on this side of the Durand Line. Pakistan’s policy of extending strategic reach into Afghanistan has devastated many lives in FATA and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Therefore, we need a security approach of our own in this province. A distinct policy that ensures better protection for ourselves and at the same time puts pressure on the federal government to change its manner of playing the Great Game.

With a stronger more efficient security system of our own, we will not only be able to better protect the province against enemies in every disguise but also one day help protect FATA as well through a merger with Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.

The writer is a regular contributor to Qissa Khwani he tweets under @AzadPashtun

Last stop Karachi 1946!

'Last Stop Karachi 1946-47' is a personal narrative of a young Englishman enlisted in RAF finally ending up in Karachi. He was an RAF driver, miles away from his pastoral home who enjoyed the simple pleasures in life in the British India. Edited by Ali Jan

part 2 of 2

Whether these Royal Enfields were sold in great numbers locally or not I’m not sure, but I well remember new Royal Enfields being on sale in Elphinstone Street from one of the shops there.  Later on of course, Royal Enfields were built and produced in India, and in fact they are still made near Madras today.  The Bullet model being one of several very successful machines.

As an MT driver I made many trips around Karachi during my nine months stay.  Regular trips were made up to the large RAF station at Mauripur, a main stopping and refuelling place for aircraft in-transit and also journeys to the RAF station at Drigh Road.

Another daily run was to deliver and collect mail for our office. I remember this mainly because the building was such an architecturally impressive large Victorian style house standing in its own grounds and set back at the end of a drive from the main gateway.  I think it was used as a hospital for service personnel but two or three small rooms had been allocated for service mail operations. 

I have since wondered what the name of the house was and what it is used for now, but all I can remember of the route to get there is that I used to drive straight down the long road from our unit and the boat basin, turn right somewhere near the KPT building and close to where a poor policeman stood on his box in the blazing sun most of the day directing traffic.  It was an anti-clockwise 4 or 5 kilometers from there.

The policeman that I have mentioned who stood on his box at the cross roads was always good for a bit of entertainment.  One day coming back from Mauripur in my truck and waiting for him to give me the signal to turn right up the Keamari road, four flat bed camel carts appeared out of the dock gates loaded with packages. 

The leading driver, followed by the others, ignored the policeman’s signal to stop and in 10 seconds the whole crossroads was in chaos.  The policeman jumped down from his box and tried to remonstrate with the drivers of the wagon-train of camels and the language between the two factions I could guess, was not the sort that would be heard in the Karachi Polo Club, even I could sense that!

A similar thing happened a month or two later when again I was waiting for the signal by the policeman to proceed and a camel cart came out of the same dock gates piled high with boxes of Palmolive soap.  The camel, frightened by a noise panicked and jumped forward and shot the load of Palmolive cases off the flatbed cart and right across the intersection.  The entertainment at these crossroads could be better than a night out at the theatre.

I also made one trip round the coast eastwards to a place called Korangi Creek where the Imperial Airways flying boats and later BOAC (British Overseas Air Corporation) used to call in for refuelling on their way to Singapore and Australia.  I had taken one of our RAF marine engineers with me, who normally worked at West Wharf on the RAF. HSLs (High Speed Launches) and Pinnaces.  The RAF kept a small boat at Korangi which was experiencing engine trouble. The engineer managed to repair the engine and he decided to bring it back himself round the coast to West Wharf by sea.  I returned in the truck alone and got caught in a violent blinding sand storm, quite the worst I had experienced on the way back between Korangi and Karachi forcing me to stop for some time to allow it to blow over.

One other incident that could have had much more serious consequences was in the yard where our mechanic did the servicing of our trucks.  He had two large wooden sheds, one as a store for oils and tins of petrol etc. and the other as his workshop.

We had an old local Muslim man there, who was employed in the MT yard to do lots of odd jobs such as greasing, tyre changing, and generally to help out on anything that needed to be done.  He was a very nice old man of probably 60, spoke very good English and all the young lads liked and respected him and used to call him Pop as they looked on him as a sort of father figure.

He was a most conscientious worker and totally loyal to our unit.  I remember once while talking to him it came up about his very red beard.  As a young 21 year old I was quite ignorant of the reason for this red beard.  He was so very proud to tell me that it indicated he had made the journey to Mecca and had gone by Dhow from Karachi on a pilgrimage.  

One boiling hot day the wooden shed in which the cans of petrol were kept, suddenly burst into flames due to the high temperature in the locked shed, and Pop, being the sort of man he was, tried to rescue some of the equipment when the flames were belching out.  In doing so he got burned on the hands and wrists.

John 'Dusty' Miller, in Sept 2005

We took him up to the Medical officer to dress his burns and sent him home but the next day he turned up as usual and carried on.  By the time we got the fire extinguished the sheds were completely destroyed and the odd thing was that the English 2 gallon petrol cans that were inside had split wide open, but the petrol in the 4-gallon American ‘Jerry cans’ had completely evaporated and were blown up like big round balloons.

Apart from the odd argument between our boys and the local tonga walla over the price of a trip back to Keamari, during the whole nine months of my stay in Karachi I never ever got the feeling that the local population resented us British airmen being there, indeed I think the local shopkeepers in Elphinstone Street welcomed us. 

Whether South African Europeans felt quite as secure I am not sure, as just near the boat basin at Keamari and on the corner of our football pitch a large notice had been erected by KMC warning them that “South African Europeans would not be welcome to Karachi in view of the racial discrimination made in their country and the anti-Indian legislation passed by them”.

Saturday night visiting restaurants, bazaars, shops and cinemas were an enjoyable and regular part of our off-duty hours and I can still remember in some of the narrow poorly lit streets, stallholders who had only oil lamps or candles to display their goods, with the exotic sweet smell of incense issuing from small smouldering Josh Sticks in the gloom - a truly romantic vision of the East.

On one of these Saturday night visits to the cinema, four of us had booked the best seats for the latest film Caesar and Cleopatra. Starring Claude Rains and Vivien Leigh.  The seats we got, turned out to be upholstered soft two-seater settees and proved so comfortable that I only saw 15 minutes of the show and dropped off to sleep, missing the rest of the performance.

Our boys had a very good relationship with the civilian KPT staff and we worked well together. My memories of these KPT chaps were that most of them seemed to carry a clipboard and pencil, which was understandable as they were mainly engaged in checking goods on and off the ships.

It was now early June 1947 and I would have completed my obligatory 2½-year tour in India the following month.  The date for the handover to self-rule was scheduled for Aug 15^th and all British forces were to leave.  The local population was naturally excited and looking forward to this day of Independence from British rule and the chance at last to run their own country since the days of Queen Victoria.

I was told to report to the transit camp at Worli in Bombay by 15^th June where I would be boarding a troopship home to the UK.  This of course was going to involve another long train journey right up to Lahore and down.

As it happened I had an old RAF pal who was stationed at Mauripur and who worked on flying control duties there.  He pulled a few strings with an officer friend of his and arranged for me to fly down on the daily Dakota flight to Bombay. The time came to say my good-byes to all my pals and I left Keamari to go up to Mauripur the night before as take off was 7 a.m. the next morning. 

I remember it so clearly, it was a gorgeous warm sunny morning as I boarded the old ‘Dak’ and as we sat at the end of the runway waiting for take-off I was of course happy to be going home after 2½ years away from my family but I was also sad to be leaving a city I had so much enjoyed and of course my unit at Keamari where I had made so many friends in the last 9 months.

As we climbed out of Mauripur I was able to get a last look down at Keamari and the boat basin and could actually see the roof of the living quarters I had just left and thinking that all my mates were down there, lying on their ‘charpoys ’under their mosquito nets.

Conclusion.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this diary, I was brought up to the simple, uncomplicated ways of life, working on our little farm in the country in England.  There are times in our lives when opportunities present themselves and we have to make decisions as to whether to take them or not.  As it happens I didn’t have any option in this, other than to follow the course I did, and it is with regret that it took World War 2 to give me this opportunity.

As any sane and normal person will agree, wars between nations are an abomination to mankind but inevitably out of all the ‘fallout’ there will be some winners and some losers.  I count myself as one of the winners. Had it not been for the war I would have probably spent the rest of my life in an insular and narrow existence in the village where I was born.  By joining the RAF in 1944 I was catapulted into a world where I could satisfy my dreams of travel and curiosities of other cultures, and what’s more, the travel and food came free.

Having whetted my appetite by these experiences I have since gone on to travel to other countries whenever funds and time off work would allow, but one of my greatest regrets is that I never made it back to Karachi.  Sadly the political situation there at times made it very difficult for westerners to visit in safety.

I have recently celebrated my 79^th birthday and I now find I have a lot of time to just sit and think, and although I don’t have any clinical idea of the workings and complexities of the human brain, in my simple way, I have always imagined it to be a very complex organ, inside which, is a vast array of small cubicles with a small sensor light over each.  Some of these lights are shining bright Green, but some are now only flickering, and some have completely gone out, but one of the lights keeps flashing RED with a notice over the top saying “MEMORY CELLS UNDER STRESS”.  It’s a symptom of reaching 79.

Author with wife on his 80th Birthday

(Editor’s note: Mr Miller, soon turning 87 years of age in Sept 2012, is retired and settled in the village of Forton, county of Somerset in England.)

This is a series which draws out memories of various people from the United Kingdom who lived in different parts of the subcontinent, pre-1947. Most of the memoirs will be published weekly. These people are now residing in different parts of the world. The series was published in print in The News TNS in 2005. It has been arranged and edited by Ali Jan