The origin of Baluchistan’s trouble goes back to many historical injustices meted out to this landwise biggest province in Pakistan. Endowed with natural resources, it is strategically located bordering Iran and Afghanistan, the two US strategic pivots in South Asia to contain China and Iran.
Baluchistan’s deep-water seaport Gwadar provides an opening to China to the Middle East. The CPEC 2, the flagship of the Belt Road project of China runs through this province which at present has become an epicenter of Western and Indian interventions by way of compounding trouble and derailing the federation efforts to mitigate the sufferings and correct historical injustices inflicted on the province.
The pact with Khan of Kalat due to the personal influence of the Quaid I Azam was violated when one unit was imposed by General Ayub Khan and the province remained outside the ambit of the Industrial Revolution during that regime. The tribal system remained intact and could not be abolished despite ZA Bhutto’s commitment to end this traditional system of tribal chieftains with lavish lifestyles while those being governed languishing in jails and facing suppression.
The SardarI system has its logic of establishing an alternative system of justice and providence in the absence of an institutionalized transparent and unbiased system of administration. Balochistan could not get Sui gas despite it having provided gas to the entire country. The lack of jobs for the local population in projects like Saindek and low-level labor jobs in CPEC has provided fuel to the enraged Baloch.
However, this is one side of the picture. The other side shows a good share for Baluchistan in the NFC Award, the opening of Army Public Schools, cadet colleges, and institutions over the last decade to get an enrolment of 24, 000 students. The 8th Conditional Amendment provides for local administration of health, education, and development schemes at the local level. Khushal Balochistan was launched. In 2013, Governor Abdul Malik announced a general amnesty for disgruntled Baloch. The sardari system still exists but most of the sardars are with the State through political process.
Now what’s the present fuel for Baluchistan’s trouble? The issue of missing persons has been blown out of proportion by the foreign NGOs in alliance with Indian and Western media. These missing persons include those who went into Afghanistan, Syria, and Iraq, those who are in prisons in neighboring countries, those who left the province due to personal enmities and criminal acts, those who left the province for jobs through human trafficking, those who were killed in infighting and are yet to be identified. The Federation set up a commission on these missing persons and slightly more than 10, 000 cases were identified out of which 8, 000 stand resolved. In contrast, in the US 521,705 cases of missing persons were registered on the FBI website. In the UK, 241, 064 and in India, 347, 529 cases of missing persons have been identified. So you find that something bigger is cooking up in Baluchistan.
The centers of trouble in Baluchistan are Afghanistan, India, foreign and local NGOs, and a massive disinformation campaign launched by some local interests in Pakistan and abroad. Kabul is the provider of support to the disgruntled and misled Baloch carrying weapons and India is instigating the unrest through its intelligence agency. The toppling of Sheikh Hasina Wajid has caused a major setback in its neighborhood. These nefarious activities must be stopped and valid data may be compiled of statements and discourse running on Indian, Afghanistan, and Western media and digital platforms.
While our army is taking on them through kinetic force, evidence of these trouble-making actors must be documented at the same time. At the government level, the grievances of the Baloch may be addressed by providing enduring solutions keeping in view the past injustices caused to them by the Federation. Baluchistan is our lifeline, it must be brought back to normalcy.
