Bugtis & Balochistan: the games people play

Recent events and the blackout in Balochistan have reminded me about this article from around 2006 by writer Gulmina Bilal.


Dera Bugti post-Nawab

Gulmina Bilal


The story goes that the elder had some guests. He asked his son to go inside and ask for tea to be sent out for the guests. The son went inside and found his stepmother in the kitchen and told her to make tea. After half an hour, the father sent the son inside again wondering how long it was taking the women to make tea. The son and the stepmother had a hot exchange, the result of which the son shot dead the stepmother. An hour later, the father shot the first wife, i.e. the son’s mother. The reason given was that to avenge the death of my wife, I shot your mother. Now we are even and can continue to be father and son.

This is not some story of a B-grade movie. This is the story of a man who is actively working with the government intelligence agencies in Dera Bugti following the death of Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti. This gentleman eventually married a Phoolan Devi-type character who used to organise highway robberies in Southern Punjab. This gentleman, Khan Mohammad Kalpar, is one of three tribal elders who is being supported and cultivated by the intelligence agencies. Khan Mohammad Kalpar is the chief of the Kalpar clan who were brought back to Dera Bugti by the government itself, as the cameras looked on. Even President General Pervez Musharraf on numerous occasions has declared that the Kalpars and their chief are essentially the victims and that is why they were rehabilitated. A victim who is wanted in a number of cases, but let’s not split hairs over that.

The other two chiefs that are being propped up by the agencies nowadays is the chief of the Masouri clan, Kadir Masouri, and the chief of the Rahejas, Amndan Bugti. Amndan Bugti is also a cousin of sorts of Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti. The Kalpars are based in Sui, the Rahejas are based in Dera Bugti, and the Masouris are based at Bekar, which is near Dera Bugti.

The three musketeers on whom the intelligence agencies are spending taxpayers’ money to prop them up in Dera Bugti are all wanted men. As I have written previously, Nawab Bugti was first a darling of the establishment and then became a pariah. The stories of G. M. Syed, Nawab Bugti and even Nawaz Sharif are no different. With the death of the Nawab and the resultant tribal power vacuum in Dera Bugti, these three musketeers are being ‘empowered’ and flushed with funds to consolidate and broaden their power base.

Given this background, let’s understand what are the immediate problems occupying the boys right now in Dera Bugti.

Right now the battle that is being played out in Dera Bugti post-Nawab is the battle for the post of the District Nazim. Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti had installed a Nazim, Kazim Bugti, against whom a no-confidence motion has been approved by the District Assembly. So now the three tribes are in the running for the Nazim’s position, each declaring that by virtue of their power, the intelligence agents should ‘approve and support’ their respective clan’s nominee. Why are they interested in the position of the District Nazim? It is certainly not for any deep conviction in devolution or local government, but because of the fact that as compensation for all that has occurred in Dera Bugti, the federal government has announced a relief and development package which is to be spent through the district government. In a nutshell, it is big money which the three elders – duly supported by the agencies – are after.

This is the issue that Dera Bugti is faced with now. Each of the clans is demanding that they should be ‘rewarded’ by the government for their respective part in helping the government against Nawab Bugti. All three elders are proclaimed offenders, but all that is being conveniently pushed under the carpet. The intelligence agencies have asked them to decide among themselves who the Nazim should be. The elders decided on Anwar Bugti, who is the son of Wadera Sher Mohammad who was very close to the Nawab. It is said that Wadera Sher Mohammad was the only man allowed to go inside the Nawab’s room apart from his personal valet. This consensus candidate of the three musketeers caused trouble in paradise between them and the agencies. The agencies reportedly rejected the nomination and were very upset that they had nominated someone close to the Nawab. Consequently the nomination was withdrawn. Thus, it is back to square one as far as choosing a Nazim is concerned. Needless to say, electing the Nazim through simple fair voting did not occur to anyone as a serious option. The District Coordination Officer Mr Sarmad Lasi, perhaps the most photographed and interviewed government servant, is also flirting with the musketeers and the agencies. On paper he has been transferred out of Dera Bugti, but he has managed to stay put because there is big money rolling about in Dera Bugti.

Like the other day’s newspaper, Dera Bugti has receded from our minds. The place that grabbed headlines three moths back does not even make it to the most obscure of the inside pages. Rhetorical statements have been made, limelight stolen, resignations given and taken back...in short, other places and people grabbed the headlines and Dera Bugti is the last thing newspaper readers have on their minds. This suits the interests of certain sections quite well.

The government is entering into alliances and arrangements as described above with the result that not one, but three potential Nawab Akbar Khan Bugtis will be created and 40 years down the line will be bombed because they challenged ‘the writ of the state’. I fail to understand that when you enter into alliances with proclaimed offenders, why is there an expectation that they will not challenge the writ of the state?

Did I hear someone ask what about the people of Dera Bugti? Well what about them? Since when have they counted as important? If the people were considered important, then would an election of the District Nazim be as problematic as it is now? If the people were considered important, then would the intelligence agencies be having free use of the people’s money to dole out? The people of Dera Bugti, of WANA and indeed of Pakistan do not count at all.

The writer is an electoral reforms and gender mainstreaming consultant based in Islamabad

Murder they wrote

A lot has been said and written about the callous and brutal murders of Syed Saleem Shahzad and Professor Saba Dashtiyari. Essential reading online on the formers case is FiveRupees blog (more so for the obvious troll defenders of his murder) and in the latters case it is Malik Akbars  article and profile of a lost Balochistan intellectual. These deaths have also reminded people of the tragic murder of Hayatullah Khan. In his unfortunate case, they did not just kill him but they also killed his wife.

 Two other bits of info particularly touched me about recent events. The first by Christine Fair, who was no supporter of Shahzad but, had this to say, "Each time I met him, I was dubious about his ostensible links to "all sides," but his death chills & disturbs immensely"
 The other was this touching video about Dashtiyari,by cartoonist J Haque, in his slightly rude and always direct approach.

My own take on all this? I have little to add: I wanted to title this post "Akhir Kyun?" (loosely translated as "In the end why?" ), and go into a lament about how things seem to lurch from tragedy to farce with the most breathless ease in Pakistan. I think I will just end it with this poem:

by Maurice Ogden
1.
Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.

The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.

And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.

And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"

Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."

And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief

And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.

2.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.

And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.

And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."

He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."

Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"

And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.

That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;

Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.

3.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"

And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."

The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"

The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."

And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.

The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.

4.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all

For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.

He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.

And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.

"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"

Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.

For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"

"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."

Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.