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Further Reading

Sindh

Sindhis constitute 13 percent of the population of Pakistan. Their traditional homeland is the province of Sind, where they maintain the country's largest concentration of large landholdings. Sindhis are a predominantly rural people. They have a strong sense of linguistic and cultural pride and identity. They have a rich literary and folk tradition and prefer to read and write in their own language, Sindhi.

During the British Raj, Sindh, situated south of Punjab, was the neglected hinterland of Bombay. The society was dominated by a small number of major landholders (waderas). Most people were tenant farmers facing terms of contract that were a scant improvement over outright servitude; a middle-class barely existed. The social landscape consisted largely of unremitting poverty, and feudal landlords ruled with little concern for any outside interference. A series of irrigation projects in the 1930s merely served to increase the wealth of large landowners when their wastelands were made more productive. Reformist legislation in the 1940s that was intended to improve the lot of the poor had little success. The province approached independence with entrenched extremes of wealth and poverty.

The Sindh plain comprises mainly the province of Sindh and stretches between the Punjab plain and the Arabian Sea. River Indus flows here as a single river and the plain comprises a vast fertile tract stretching westward from the narrow strip of flood plain on the right bank of River Indus, and a vast expanse of desert stretching eastward from the left bank. The desert area is dry and desolate like Cholistan in the Punjab plain. But, the plain area right of River Indus is green with a vast stretches of vegetation lined everywhere with avenues of trees.

It is the heart of the Indus Valley Civilization dating back to 3rd millennium B.C. Thousands of tourists from all over the world are attracted every year to visit the ruins of Moenjodaro near Larkana. An elaborate canal system taken from Sukkur Barrage at Sukkur, Upper Sindh Barrage north of Sukkur at Guddu, and Lower Sindh Barrage (Ghulam Muhammad Barrage) at Hyderabad, irrigate together in this area over 10,000,0000 acres and account for about 40 per cent of Pakistan's irrigated land. The fertile area yields abundant crops of rice, wheat and cotton and contains the bulk of the population and most of the major commercial and industrial centres of Sindh such as Hyderabad(795,000), Sukkur (193,000), Larkana (123,000), Nawabshah (102,000), Shikarpur (88,000) and Dadu (39,000).

However, its southern part is one of the worst areas of Pakistan for waterlogging and salinity. There are many lakes in Sindh,which attract thousands of migratory birds during the winter season from Central Asia. Manchhar lake with its highly pulsating expanse of about 200 sq. miles of area is the largest lake. With its foliage of towering grasses, its meadows of floating lotus, its inhabitants in their floating habitations, the lake presents an attractive look. Further south, stretches the Indus Delta, which is a savage waste. An important feature is the Kinjhar Lake near Thatta, which acts as a great reservoir for feeding canals in the adjacent areas. During winter, it is an ideal spot for fishing and duck shooting. South of the Kinjhar Lake, the surface is broken and littered with abandoned channels of distributries, sandy beaches, ridges and mangrove swamps, all merging into the dead creeks, grate and salt water of the coast of Rann of Kutch. At the extreme north-western end of the delta stands Karachi, the largest city and the industrial and commercial hub of Pakistan. It is also the port for Pakistan and terminal of Pakistan's railway system and the site of the country's principal international airport.

As Pakistan is located on a great landmass north of Tropic of Cancer, between latitudes 24 and 37 N, it has a continental type of climate, characterized by extreme variations of temperature. The areas closer to the snow-covered northern mountains are cold. Temperatures on the Balochistan Plateau are comparatively high. Along the coastal strop, the climate is modified by sea breezes. In the rest of the country, temperature rises steeply in the summer and hot winds, called "loo", blow across the plains during the day, dust storms and thunder storms occasionally lower the temperature. The diurnal variation in temperature may be as much as 11 to 17oC. Winters are cold with minimum temperature of about 4oC in January.

There was considerable upheaval in Sindh in the years following partition. Millions of Hindus and Sikhs left for India and were replaced by roughly 7 million muhajirs, who took the places of the fairly well-educated emigrant Hindus and Sikhs in the commercial life of the province. Later, the muhajirs provided the political basis of the Refugee People's Movement (Muhajir Qaumi Mahaz--MQM). As Karachi became increasingly identified as a muhajir city, other cities in Sindh, notably Thatta, Hyderabad, and Larkana, became the headquarters for Sindhi resistance.

During the 1980s, there were repeated kidnappings in the province, some with political provocation. Fear of dacoits (bandits) gave rise to the perception that the interior of Sindh was unsafe for road and rail travel. Sectarian violence against Hindus erupted in the interior in 1992 in the wake of the destruction of the Babri Mosque in Ayodhya, India, by Hindu extremists who sought to rebuild a Hindu temple on the contested site. In the 1990s Sindh continued to be an ethnic battlefield within Pakistan.

In Karachi and Hyderabad, there has been recurring violence characterized by bombings, violent demonstrations and shootings. An October 2007 suicide attack on former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto killed more than 130 and injured approximately 375 people in Karachi. In the aftermath of her December 2007 death, rioting in Karachi led to multiple deaths and injuries, as well as widespread property damage. In May 2008, clashing groups of lawyers burned buildings and vehicles in several areas of the city, resulting in at least 11 fatalities. Americans and other westerners continue to be a particular target of hostility and occasional anti-Western mob violence. The US Consulate General in particular has been the target of several major terrorist attacks or plots in recent years, including a deadly March 2006 suicide attack. Non-essential travel to these cities is strongly discouraged. In rural Sindh Province, the security situation is hazardous, especially for those engaged in overland travel. The Government of Pakistan recommends that travelers limit their movements in Sindh Province.

Sindh Nationalism

Pakistan is a multilingual state in which it is possible to develop group identity in terms of one's language. The Bengalis were the first to forge such an identity during the language movements of 1948 and 1952. The Sindhi nationalists did the same but with less strength and success in January 1970 and July 1972. Now most Sindhi nationalist organizations spend more time on attacking each other than furthering the cause of Sindhi rights.

Sindh is a separate and distinct nation with its own language, culture and social system. According to Sindh nationalists, Sindh voluntarily surrendered its independence in order to contribute to the creation of a new state (Pakistan), under the conditions that full autonomy would be guaranteed to all the Federating Units and by the pledge to protect the social, cultural, linguistic and other rights of their inhabitants. But as soon as Pakistan came into being, the rulers of the day established their authoritarian rule over Sindh and the process to deny the right to Sindhis, began.

The province is virtually divided between the Urdu-speaking urban areas, which support the MQM, and the Sindhi-speaking people. Sindh Nationalists complain that with the creation of Pakistan, large number of Urdu speaking Muslims from India were encouraged to immigrate and settle in Sindh. They charge that the first nominated Prime Minister of newly created Pakistan, Liaquat Ali, who himself was a refugee, encouraged the Urdu speaking muslims of India to immigrate and settle in the Urban areas of Sindh, specially Karachi to create a electoral constituency for himself. Evacuee property was allocated free to the Urdu speaking refugees from India, who call themselves Muhajirs (immigrants). While it is usually said that muhajirs are highly educated and trained, Sindh Nationalists complain that it was only the poor lower class of Urdu speaking muslims looking for the better life, who were encouraged to immigrate to Pakistan and given preferential facilities, including free housing, businesses grants, free land allocation, by the first nominated urdu speaking Prime Minister Mr Liaquat Ali Khan.

Sindhi language has remained the national language of Sindh throughout its history, but this status was denied after the creation of Pakistan by the Urdu speaking nominated Prime Minister of Pakistan, who imposed Urdu as the national language of Pakistan in 1947. Although according to the government survey in 1988, Urdu is spoken only by 6% population, Urdu remains the only national language of Pakistan. However, in 1972 when the official status of Sindhi was being restored in Sindh by the Sindh Parliament, ethnic disturbances were started by the Muhajir minority, resulting in the loss of life of many Sindhi civilians specially in Karachi. The transfer of population continues to take place, resulting in the imbalance of the population and tension between the native Sindhis and immigrant Muhajirs and the ethnic cleansing of Sindhis by the militant MQM terrorists.

The Sindh Water Committee, while protesting at the continuous water scarcity in Sindh, has held the federal government, Wapda and Punjab responsible for the situation. Terming it a gross injustice, in March 2000 SWC leaders Rasool Bux Palijo and Abrar Kazi in a press statement said that through this act Punjab was being allowed to steal water meant for Sindh.

Although 30% of Pakistan's revenues are spent on defence, Sindh and its people do not benefit from it. About 90% of the so called active border between India and Pakistan happens to be along the Punjab province. From foot soldiers to the officers corp, the overwhelming majority of the military personnel is recruited from Punjab or Frontier provinces. Major military installations and strategic facilities are also situated either there or along the coastal lines. Even when the small cantonments are built in Sindh, most of the contracts and employment opportunities are offered to people from selective groups rather than the local communities.

The irony is, when in free countries, military bases are withdrawn from the inner cities, people residing in those areas experience severe economic set-backs. In Sindh and in Baluchistan, establishment of military bases of the army are perceived to be a threat to the local population.