PESHAWAR: Only a handful of people who are protesting the proposed scraping of the Khasadar Force – a British era policing system in the erstwhile Fata – have traditionally benefitted from the system in the shape of hereditary employment compared to the people at large, reveals background interviews with officials and locals.

“Jobs in the Khasadar Force were doled out before and after Partition to influential Maliks and elders, who either retained the same over decades in their families or sold them to relatives,” said a senior functionary dealing with Levies and Khasadars in the merged tribal districts.

Lists collected from the offices of former political agents show that majority of the Khasadars belong to the families of influential people, including former and sitting parliamentarians, chieftains, Maliks and government officials. Many influential families were granted six to nine Khasadari.

Most khasadars belong to families of influential people

“A retired civil servant from Waziristan, who had served as commissioner, had also retained Khasadari,” said another official.

The official said another person from South Waziristan tribal district was serving as a lecturer in a government college and as a Khasadar official simultaneously.

A retired official disclosed that in some cases, political agents were found to be allotting Khasadari to the people before the birth of male children in families of Khyber district.

He added that such cases were found in other tribal areas, too.

“After Partition, Khasadari was used as a tool to bribe people in Fata,” he said.

A journalist from South Waziristan admitted that his grandfather was allotted two Khasadaris before Partition.

He said his grandfather had died around 20 years ago but the family was still getting salary in his (grandfather’s) name.

The lists obtained from the office of Orakzai tribal district’s deputy commissioner show that a Malik hailing from Mamozai tribe still retains six Khasadaris.

Another elder from Manikhel tribe of the area has been granted four Khasadaris.

The British government had introduced Khasadari system in former Waziristan Agency and gradually extended to other tribal agencies, where they (the British) did not have direct control. Khasadari was distributed among the clans and sub-tribes.

The colonial government conceived the system both as a solution to crimes in a region they had little ingress or influence in, and as a means to placate tribal elders into taking on a de facto policing role instead of making trouble.

The government had also introduced Levies Force, a sort of regular policing system, in the erstwhile Fata to assist the political administrations in respective tribal agencies to deal with petty crimes. The Levies Force was regularised in the last government of Pakistan Peoples Party.

Officials said after the merger of tribal areas with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and abolition of the Frontier Crimes Regulation, there was no justification for the continuation of Khasadari system.

They said influential families were trying to preserve the outdated policing system of Khasadari to protect their financial interest.

The officials said after Khasadars staged protests and boycotted duties in some areas, the federal and provincial governments decided to evolve a mechanism for the absorption of 15,673 Khasadar personnel in KP police.

The provincial establishment department recently constituted a four-member committee headed by adviser to the chief minister on merged districts Ajmal Khan Wazir to engage Levies and Khasadars.

Other members of the committee included secretary for home and tribal affairs department, provincial police officer, and senior officers of the 11 Corps.

Ajmal Wazir said the issues related to Khasadar and Levies forces had been resolved after negotiations and that the personnel would be absorbed in the provincial police.

He said Khasadars would not lose their jobs as the government would come up with a legal mechanism for their absorption in police.

The provincial government had promulgated the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Levies Force (Transition) Ordinance, 2019, in merged districts last month giving policing powers to the force.

Published in Dawn, April 7th, 2019