THE ROLE OF THE BALOCH “KACHHA” AREAS AND THE FUTURE OF PAKISTAN

If a standard officially issued political map of Pakistan is to be observed, then it can be seen that the boundaries of the Punjab and Sindh Provinces fall to the left of the River Indus, instead of directly upon it. These narrow strips are known as “Kachha” areas and consist of thick riverine jungles which are for all intents and purposes unmanageable. Adjacent to neighbouring Balochistan, these areas are actually Baloch abutments but have been deliberately included in Punjab and Sindh because of special ethnic characteristics. (In ethnological studies, the River Indus represents the natural and historical geographic dividing line between the Iranian [Pashtun & Baloch] and Indian [Punjab & Sindh] ethno-cultural domains. The valley surrounding the river represents the watershed zone between these two worlds. Such knowledge comes in useful to geopolitical planners).

These Baloch dominated enclaves had been cunningly included in these two provinces as local buffer “strips” by British strategists and ethnic specialists who had silently worked out the most minute details of how to construct the most effective components of an elaborate protective buffer mechanism with which to defend the fabulous Indian Empire, the resources and control of which had catapulted their tiny European island to the apex of global dominion. The “Pakistanis” who succeeded the British as their proxies and dependents naturally left all such arrangements intact as their interests were very much the same. They faithfully retained all such measures and intricacies of British rule, despite the hullaballoo Pakistanis made regarding the “sacredness” of their “independence”.

These Indus left bank riverine enclaves are ethnically Baloch, but these are the areas where the Baloch ethnicity begins to mesh with the southern Punjabi and western Sindhi parts of the Indus Valley, which they influence greatly. Such Balochis may not conform to one’s perfect model of the ethnic Baloch because they speak Punjabi, Jatki (Seraiki) and Sindhi and their affairs and concerns lie in those spheres rather than in Balochistan itself. Therefore these areas belong administratively within Punjab and Sindh — but are valuable because due to their separate innate Baloch character and identification, so they form a “different” sort of Baloch template which acts as a buffer to the main Baloch body. In the event of a successful Iranian, Afghan or Russian — or combined — invasion of the wild and unruly Baloch hinterland, it was theorised that these Punjabi and Sindhi “frontier regions” would act as sub-buffers for the British authorities in helping them to organise their defences. And the main modus operandi of the function of these ethnic buffers was the harnessing of this “ethnic differential” and its mechanical interplay.

It turns out that now, in the changed circumstances of the onset of Pakistan’s terminal crisis, these godforsaken wild and backward areas are once again playing a potent role in the goings on, but this time of a different sort. Having long been the lawless hideouts for Baloch-dominated gangs of marauders and raiders known as “dacoits” by the British (from “dakait” or “dakoo” or robber in the local Indic languages), the denizens of these enclaves are now hand in glove with the Pashtun dominated Pakistani Taliban or TTP, who also have a support base in the impoverished southern Punjab. Not only that but this nexus extends further into the heart of the restive Balochistan Province itself, which is in the throes of a secular separatist insurgency. Political and religious hype apart, an ethnically aware observer will not fail to notice the presence and operation of the dynamic of the “Iranian-Indic divide” here, in the undoing of Pakistan.

If Imran Khan naively and unsuccessfully tried to replace Pakistan’s original neo-colonial system with his own form of populist fascism at the outset, it might not at all be farfetched for his disgruntled motley of supporters to consider a coalition of convenience with the TTP-Balochi nexus in acting against the traditional neo-colonial Pakistani state — especially if the going gets tough, and there are many pointers in that direction. It may be added, that although Pakistan’s traditional arbiters successfully thwarted Imran Khan’s attempt, the truth is that they have been effectively abandoned by their old Anglo-American masters as the geopolitical strategy has changed, for which all these arrangements were created. Pakistan’s alternate overtures with China and Russia have failed; it wants patronage not partnership. Imran Khan may be out of the game himself, but he has struck a deep chord in the benighted Pakistani population and his followers are highly charged and numerous and desperate.

Whatever the eventual outcomes, what seems to be on the horizon is a rump Pakistani hinterland composed of the Punjab and Sindh provinces — with the outlying wild and restive Iranian (Pashtun and Baloch) western buffer regions out of control. It appears that this is the way the cookie of the “redundant Jinnah state” will crumble, unless the coalition of opponents factor mentioned above manages somehow to prolong its life.