Travel writers are myth busters

I first wrote in 1986 that the Kalasha people of Chitral are NOT of Greek descent. That was a time when everyone, including everyone, believed that. Now, thankfully, DNA testing has shown my assertion to be true.

There have always been quasi-religious stories of the power of holy men. The story of the struggle between Wali Kandahari and Guru Nanak and the resulting hand print in Hasan Abdal is shown to be false by history. Wali Kandahari died twenty years before Guru Nanak was born. Not that Guru Nanak was not one of the greatest spiritual leader.

The myth of the Karakoram Highway being the old Silk Road. The road between Hunza and Kashgar was a local travel route. No long distance trade came into the subcontinent this way. Least of all silk. The old trade route from, say, Yarkand or Kashgar was over the Karakoram Pass in the east that led to Leh (Ladakh) and eventually Srinagar via Kargil.

Then there are the several stories of Invisible Saints. The one just outside the PTV station in Lahore can easily be investigated. Another is the Jhandian vali Sarkar at Choa Kariala midway between Kharian and Jhelum. This one is a complete and total fraud. It was created after the famous signal exercise November Handicap. The place where the so-called tomb now stands was one of the gun positions of 14 Field Regiment Artillery. Someone saw the flags and the rifleman’s trench and turned it into a Pir Ghaib who had gone into purdah.