Bajaur Agency, aka Turban Central.The boys between the age of 15 and 22 were kidnapped by Taliban in the first week of September last year when they were picnicking just over the Afghan border. They belong to the Mamoond tribe, a fun loving people unlike the other tribes in Bajaur, the smallest of the seven tribal agencies borders Afghanistan's Kunar province
... which is right down the road from Chitral. Kunar is Haqqani country.....
. Later, they were released after months of negotiations involving local elders and political administration.
It was a bright sunny day but the general impression was shadowy. Nothing had changed since my last trip in October last year. I was not expecting much either. The same checkposts, the same complaints against the rigid behaviour of Para-military forces though the military justifies its stiffness to bring order in an area still brimmed with Taliban sympathisers.
The boys mostly bearded and dressed in shalwar camese, a traditional dress, appeared shy and reluctant to talk about their ordeal. Unlike the usual boys of their age, they had no dreams and ambitions. They look tired and life seemed a burden on their meek shoulders. Why you boys don't study, I asked. We cannot afford to study, we are poor people, said Abdullah, 22, with a shrug of his shoulders. But what if you are provided opportunities to study, will you, I asked, yes we will, almost all of them said.
There is no source of entertainment for these young and vulnerable boys. Do you watch TV, I asked the boys, we do not own television, they responded with a wry smile that made me feel embarrassed. Only one boy said his family owns television but he can't watch because of scheduled power outages. "We get electricity for a while after three days," Kifayatullah, 20, said with a profound resignation.
Only two of the boys was knew who the prime minister of Pakistain, while nobody knew who is the governor of Khyber Pukhtunkhwa, a person who directly controls the affairs of tribal areas through political agent. They only knew that political agent is the most powerful person on earth. Such is the gap between people and the state.
They had no idea what USAID or UKAID were but when I told them that USAID has given more than $5 billion in civilian assistance to Pakistain since 2002, they looked indifferent and didn't react much.
"Yes, we understand that this is a big problem that the US assistance is not experienced on the ground but now we are trying to develop our projects in such a way that the assistance reaches directly to the people," said US Embassy Spokesperson Mark Stroh.
Narrating the story, Ziaullah, 25, said that it was Eid day and they wanted to picnic in an area called Kandao, across the Afghan border. We were total 23 boys. While drinking water from a spring, six people holding AK 47 surrounded us and said that they would be taken to see their Emir (leader) and released subsequently but it didn't happen.
We spent the first night in the mountains and later we were divided in groups and kept separately. They were vigilant but didn't beat us or tortured us. Just once they let us talk to our families on phone. One boy, Hamidulla, 15, who beat feet from Taliban earlier, narrated his story saying that one night he woke up and saw that his captors were asleep. He said he thought if he was asked what he was doing, he would say he wanted to leak but when he realised that nobody got alerted, he bravely ran away. "For hours I walked in the jungle at night. Nobody was there but a dog confronted me. I tried to run but it bit me. I lied in the jungle for hours as the pain was too excruciating but finally, I made it home," he said with such ease and innocence.
Our captors' accent was like us but we didn't know them. They said we were taken hostage because of the Lashkar (tribal force) launched by our elders, Zia said.
When I asked, "Were they not stopped at the border on both sides by the paramilitary forces?" "Nobody stopped us on either side but generally we don't need visa or passport to cross the border. That's how it is for centuries," Rehmatullah said. An elder said there is confusion, we don't know who is supporting Taliban on both sides. A common statement you hear from people in the tribal belt.
"Life was much better before. There was poverty but at least there was peace. Since the arrival of Taliban, our life has changed. We miss the old times as military now very strict with us and at times their behaviour is humiliating," one of the young boys said asking not to be named for obvious security reasons.
Majority of the boys does labour jobs in Punjab. We don't know who the Taliban were but we only saw they were having beards and long hair. The Inqilaab, (the arrival of Taliban in Bajaur Agency is called revolution) wasted 3-year of my studies and now I want to resume it again, said Zubair Sayed, 14, a student of 5th grade.