Upper Swat Canal, Defying Mountains
02 June 2015
The Yusufzai Plain stretches from the Mahaban Mountains in the north to the line of the Grand Trunk Road, passing through Nowshera and from the Indus in the east just west of Mardan. Of all the districts of the North West Frontier, now called Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, this is agriculturally the richest and most prosperous.
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| The weir |
Labels: Book of Days 2015, Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa, Swat, Waters of Empire
posted by Salman Rashid @ 00:00,
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Paradise regained?
01 June 2015
When they first saw this beautiful land they called it Shubhavastu — the Good (or Fertile) Land. Stand atop the hill of Brikot just after you have descended into the Swat Valley from Malakand Pass and gaze northward. There, spreading below you is a broad flood plain with the Swat River braided across it in two or three streams with islands between them and on either bank neatly parcelled squares of cultivation, and you know that the Sanskrit speakers were on the ball. Fertilised by the perennial river, this is the Good Land.
In the vernacular, Shubhavastu became Suvastu with the initial ‘su’ meaning ‘good’. When Alexander and his legions came hither in the latter part of the 4th century BCE, they altered the name according to their own usage. The Shubhavastu of the learned man and the Suvastu of the farmer who worked its fertile breast became Soastos on Western tongues. Thence it was a short journey for the valley and its river to be called Swat.
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posted by Salman Rashid @ 00:00,
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A gutsy crusader
20 May 2015
A lesser woman in remote Seejbun in Swat’s Matta sub-division would have given up. In fact, she would have been born resigned to the usual fate of domestic confinement and a long, inconsequential life. That, so she was always told, was Pakhtun culture. Part of this baggage was also to be wedded as soon as she attained puberty. That was the way for the young women in Seejbun.
But Gul Khandana was born different. After she finished primary school in the only girls’ school miles away from her village, the pressure from uncles and older cousins was for her to be restricted to the home. Fortunately, she had a brother younger than her and unable to exert pressure. She also enjoyed her father’s support and was thus able to join the local boys’ high school to complete her middle level education at age 17. Still a long way to being educated, Gul resolved to become a teacher.
Read more »Labels: Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa, People, Swat, TNS
posted by Salman Rashid @ 00:00,
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When the meek inherit the earth
04 May 2015
The wali was as a father to the district, they say. He provided education to all regardless of gender and established two thousand schools in the district. He gave justice without bias and he gave it swiftly. In his age, the civil servant was just that: a servant of the citizen.
Misdemeanour on the part of an employee of the State of Swat could be reported and action brought down speedily against the miscreant. In his time, no one could so much as cut a twig, leave alone poach a whole tree. Best of all, there was peace and rule of law in the country under the wali’s rule.
Read more »Labels: Swat
posted by Salman Rashid @ 00:00,
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Five Days in Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa
11 August 2013
Swat was where I began my yatra of a number of archaeological sites. Hussain Qazi and I arrived in Mingora to dull grey skies and a pissing drizzle. Our dear friend Colonel Zeeshan Faisal Khan had arranged for us to put up at the Circuit House in Saidu. Or is it Mingora? The two towns on either side of the now polluted stream can only be figured out on the second day.
The Circuit House is now like a fortress to remind all and sundry of the terrible time the terrorists gave to this once beautiful and much visited valley. The windows of the first floor room that opened onto spacious terraces on all sides are now sheltered behind high walls and a tin roof so that no one can see the terrace from the surrounding mountains. The raised walls have rifleman’s openings – not real loopholes, but square openings. It was sad to see this reminder of bad times.
Labels: Discoveries of Empire, Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa, Swat
posted by Salman Rashid @ 00:00,
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