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When water at Tarbela recedes, Bharukot Fort emerges to reveal an eventful history spanning centuries
The waters of the world’s largest earthfill dam recede each winter, leaving behind a rich tapestry of historical forts, battlefields, shrines and villages that tug at the curiosity of wanderers like myself.
Prior to the damming of the Indus at Tarbela in the 1970s, the now largely submerged Trans-Indus region of Tanawal in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, had for centuries served as a strategic corridor for caravans and armies travelling between Kabul and Kashmir.
This transformed the rocky hills of Tanawal into a stage where the ambitions of machiavellian Nawabs, Khans, Rajas and Pirs played out in a fascinating game of premodern realpolitik.