RAJANPUR: Mohammad Murad just wants to go back to his hometown.

He had fled his home in Phelawagh, a small town of Dera Bugti district, after his brother got killed when his motorbike hit a landmine said to have been laid by Baloch militants.

That was five years ago.

Now he has signed up with the Pakistan Poverty Alleviation Fund, which is facilitating the return home of the 900 Masoori Bugtis families settled all over Rajanpur — a south Punjab district bordering with Balochistan — for the past four to 10 years.

“I cannot wait to get back home and start all over,” Murad said.

“I knew it was time to take our family to some place safe when my brother got killed — between 60 and 70 people had died in my town because of landmines. But I haven’t heard of any such incident in the last couple of years. Now it’s time to head back home.”

Several thousand Masoori Bugtis were forced to flee their hometown between 2005 and 2010 when they found themselves caught in the crossfire between the army and the Baloch militants.

Most families took refuge in southern districts of Punjab as they found them closer and safer.

“Most of us kept living there despite the deteriorating security conditions following the death of Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti [in a military strike at his mountain hideout in 2006],” recalled Wali Mohammad, whose family walked around 50 kilometres to cross over to Punjab.

“But when the army left Dera Bugti and Baloch Republican Army fighters returned to lay landmines everywhere to punish those who had sided with the army, it became impossible for the rest of us to survive there any longer,” he said, adding that he was happy that they could now return home without the fear of ‘accidentally’ getting killed by a landmine.

A vast majority of ‘internally’ displaced Baloch tribesmen are settled all over Rajanpur while others have made D.G. Khan their home, working as farm workers in exchange for temporary shelter and nominal wages in the form of a small share in the farm produce.

“These people are the poorest of the poor, living in extremely oppressive conditions here without any source of income,” said Asad Bugti, chief of the Nohkani Bugtis, a sub-tribe of the Masooris, who persuaded the PPAF to finance his tribesmen’s return and rehabilitation back home. “There’s no one to take care of these displaced people here,” he said.

He was of the opinion that militancy in Dera Bugti had been under control for some time. “At this moment we’ve an opportunity to let the people know that they can go back home and live a peaceful, normal life without any fear. It is also time to dismantle whatever is left of the old Sardari system and help the Baloch people improve their lives by providing them education, healthcare, etc. They are not destined to live in absolute poverty and on charity. Are they?” he said of the crowd gathered at a tobacco factory in Jampur to collect food, clothes and cash for their travel from the PPAF staff.

The PPAF decided to facilitate the journey after getting the go-ahead from both the army and the government of Balochistan. “They want to do right by these internally displaced people who have lived under the open sky like animals all these years,” PPAF boss Qazi Azmat Isa said of the government and the military.

The journey back home for many is filled with both hope and fear. “I do not know what is in store for us when we get back home, but I know that I want to be home again. How long can I live here like a refugee?” said Saib Khan, whose family fled to Rajanpur immediately after the military action began in Dera Bugti in 2005.

Asad Bugti agreed. “There is hope and there is uncertainty about the future. We need the government to provide protection to the people so that they don’t have to flee again. The people should be convinced that problems of Balochistan can be fixed. But first the government will have to establish its writ in the troubled area.”

Wali, who lives and works on the land of the Legharis in Kot Hassoo in Mauza Darkhwast Jamal Khan of D.G. Khan, wants the government to do a little more than just protect them when they get back home. “We’ve lost our livelihood due to the conflict. It is the duty of the government to help us stand on our own feet again.”

Published in Dawn, March 29th, 2015

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