MUZAFFARGARH: Despite its issues being a colonial force, the British had managed to get detailed gazetteers of the districts of Punjab written, which are still used as a source of information regarding history of the districts. However, after the independence in 1947, not much work has been done in this regard.

Now, Muzaffargarh DC Dr Ehtasham Anwar has compiled a gazetteer for the district during his stay of less than a year here.

The gazetteer used to be the most important and authentic document of a given district as it gave all the relevant details such as history, geography, population, traditions, economy and agriculture of the district.

The first gazetteer of the district was compiled and published in 1916. Then a gazetteer by was compiled by Muzaffargarh DC Edward H. Lincolns in 1929. In the early 1960’s, an officer on special duty (OSD) was assigned the task to compile gazetteers for all its districts of Multan Division who reportedly produced a copy about Muzaffargarh in 1964.

Besides compiling the updated gazetteer, Mr Anwar has also introduced an electronic version too, which would be available online, with a search option for people to find out any specific information they would be looking for. In other words, it’s the first ever e-Gazetteer of any district in Pakistan.

Talking to Dawn, Ehtsham Anwar said the first copy of the gazetteer would be presented to the chief secretary soon, after which it would be made available to the general public.

He added that chief secretary would press a button to formally launch the online version of the gazetteer which would be available on www.muzaffargarh.net.

Published in Dawn, October 14th, 2019