Swat--- A Perspective

I was watching a documentary on situation in North West Pakistan, it includes mention of Swat, in news and in a war since last few months. Reportedly a strong centre of Taliban, inhabited by people who want nothing but Sharia rule.

Few days back a friend was telling me that in areas like Swat and Mardan, the support for Taliban is local population; locals, as per his information, did not resist the Talibs, and welcomed them. His opinion is that the Local people are aligned with Taliban. More drastically, he said that Taliban faced resistance only by Shias and Ismailis, on contrary Sunnis welcomed them.

I think these two points, that Swat is a stronghold of Taliban and that the Sunni population is supporting them, are the key points to understand the situation. The least I can say is that both shows a deliberate fabrication to distort the truth. Here I will concentrate on the first point first.

I have been to Swat twice, it was the place where we went for our honey moon, I still remember the white palace, old palace of the former rulers of Swat. I remember the people, and no one ever can make me believe that those people supports Taliban. They were the most progressive and secular people I met in North West Pakistan. We entered into Swat via Malakand, and there was a noticeable difference in the outlook of people, Swatis were more sophisticated, educated and entrepreneurial. I still remember and very dearly remember the first image of Swat I got, and that was of young children going to schools, a university on our way to Mingora, and groups of girls clad in school uniforms. I can not believe that this image can be changed within four years, it is unbelievable.

I can not believe those people were so weak that they gave way to extremist just like that. There must be other factors, factors which are important to be considered.

Here my first objective is to correct the image of Swat we have been forced to perceive, to correct the image of those beautiful places, Mingora, Saidu Sharif, Manglour, KalaKot, KhuazaKhela, Malam Jabba, Bahrain, Kalaam, Ushu, Utror; and to correct the image of people who live here.

Swat has a history which goes back to ancient times, Swat has been mentioned in Rig Veda, it was once a centre of Buddhist education, it was traversed by Alexander the Great, it was an important part of Mauryan empire, then of Kushans. Can we believe that once Sanskirit was the major language of Swat? That it is thought to be the origin of Vajrayana Budhism. The region came into contact with Islam in around 11th Century, and went under influence of Afghans most of the times. History tells us that people of Swat fought bravely against Mughals. State of Swat was found around mid nineteen century, and it existed till1969.

The people are mostly Pushtoons or Kohistanis ( also called Kaafirs), well two totally different blends to say the least, but this distinction (or difference as Pushtoons and Kohistanis speak different languages, they have different customs and traditions, even different believes) creates a more tolerating and open society which you can not imagine for example in Dir or MaalaKand, which are purely Pashtoon. Another distinction Swat has, is its history as an state. Because it was a state, the population was starkly poor, less tribal and more open towards external influence, though most of Pushtoon population belongs to YousufZai clan, still as people of the Wali of Swat, their outlook was less tribal. We can see similarities with the state of Kabul, as compared to the so called tribal areas of today’s Pakistan. As Swat became a tourist attraction, this distinction became more and more remarkable, because of external influence people of Swat were exposed to.

I do not have statistics in hand, but I believe that education standard in Swat was much better than any tribal area. Communication facilities were better, as Swat is a tourist attraction, hence more transport, more trade and more links with rest of country, even links with the rest of world. Malam Jabba is the only Ski Resort in Pakistan, people in thousands were supposed to visit Swat annually. Due to trade and tourism, people from other areas of Pakistan were doing jobs in Swat. All together it means a continuous influx of ideas from rest of world. And this is what makes Swat different than for arguments sake Waziristan or Bajod, and that is what makes more difficult for me to understand what went wrong here? And the doubt I have on the theory that people of Swat actually supported Taliban.