Abstract
Among various landmarks in the history of FATA, the British
colonial phase in the Indian subcontinent is an important one. The
description of British traveler historians about the land now known as
FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas) in Pakistan has been highly
derogatory presenting the Pukhtuns of FATA to the world as savages.
About Waziristan, Lowell Thomas wrote:
‘… thank God we are thousands of miles away from
Waziristan, with its wolf-like inhabitants, its appalling and
dirt, disease and sudden death. As we view it barrenness,
its hellish temperatures, its cities filled with dust from afar,
it comes back to us as the very navel of bedevilment. Surely
the men who guard such plague-spots on Britain’s “farflung battle-line” deserve much gratitude from stay-athome Englishmen; more, indeed, than they are likely to
get'. 1
This abhorrent quote shows how an arrogant colonial mind could
see the impassable and indomitable tribal areas on the north-western
frontier of India. This paper is aimed at to see by comparison as to what
has transformed there. The same Waziristan when seen through Google
satellite in year 2013, shows to the world the recent episode in the series
of devastation caused by invaders and the resistance offered to them by
the proud inhabitants of the FATA, who have been bartering their
freedom for blood since centuries.
Anwar Shaheen, Nazish Khan. (2014) FATA: AT THE THRESHOLD OF CHANGE , Pakistan , Volume 50, Issue 1.
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