Among the Wild Tribes of the Afghan Frontier / A Record of Sixteen Years' Close Intercourse with the Natives of the Indian Marches

by T. L. Pennell

Flour Mills near Shinkiari

This kind of life was more to the taste of Sarwar than the drudgery of mill-grinding, and before long he and Asghar had joined hands. Once, indeed, they were fairly caught, though they escaped the penalty of their misdeeds. They were on the prowl one dark night, when they saw a shrouded figure creeping along by a farm wall. They had scarcely hid behind a bush when the unknown man turned and came directly towards them. Thinking they had been observed, Asghar called out: “Who are you? Stand, or I fire.” The figure halted, and said in a low tone: “It is well; I am your own.” The man then came up and suggested that they should spend that night together and share their luck. He told them, too, that there was a fine fat dumba in the farmyard hard by that they might begin upon. Asghar slipped over the wall, while Sarwar and the stranger kept guard, and soon returned with the sheep across his shoulders, its head wrapped up in his chadar to stop its cries. They took it off into the jungle, and as the stranger said he wished to be home early that night, they decided to stay and divide it there and then.

The stranger surprised them by saying that he would be content with merely the head as his share, so the “Allahu akbar” was pronounced, the throat cut, and the head given to the stranger, who went off with their parting greeting, “May it be well before you,” which he returned by saying, “In the safety of God.”

Next morning they were astonished by the sudden appearance of a posse of the Border Military Police, who, before they were able to escape or offer resistance, handcuffed them and led them off, vouchsafing no more explanation than that the Chhota Sahib had ordered it. They were much mystified, and could not think which of their enemies had got up a case against them; but they could learn nothing from the police, who either could or would tell nothing more. When, finally, they were taken before the Sahib, and he started away with, “So, you have been after your old game again, and stole a sheep last night from the farm of Nuruddin” (the light of religion), it was with difficulty they could conceal their astonishment and compose themselves quickly enough to reply that they were honest men, had never stolen anything all their lives, and could bring witnesses to prove that last night they never stirred from the chauk of Fath Muhammad of Dilrogha village.

The Sahib had a twinkle in his eye as he led them on with further questions to forswear themselves still more hopelessly, and then finally turned to a Sepoy by his side and simply said, “Bring it in.” The Sepoy saluted, went out, and in a moment returned bringing something wrapped up in a chadar, which he placed on the table before him. The Sahib unrolled it, and exposed to their astonished gaze the very sheep’s head they had given to the stranger the night before. He had been none other than the Sahib himself! They could no longer hide their confusion, and could say nothing more than “La haula wala kowata ilia bi ’llah” (There is no majesty or power but in God; He only is great). They were treated to a very pointed lecture, and told that none of their movements could remain concealed from the eyes of the Sarkar, and that next time they were caught they would be lodged in the hawalat (gaol).

Though Sarwar and his friend gained hereby a wholesome dread of the ubiquity of their ruler, yet the lesson did not restrain them from carrying on their depredations. Not long after Asghar was killed in a cattle-lifting raid on a neighbouring tribe. The villagers were aroused by the barking of the village dogs, started a chigah in pursuit, and, though Sarwar escaped, a stray shot hit Asghar in the chest and put an end to his career. Sarwar made such progress in the art, and carried his depredations so far afield, that he became known on all the hills round by the sobriquet of “Chikki,” or the “Lifter.”

One day a chance circumstance gave a fresh turn to his career. Mullah Darweza, of Saman village, had a bitter grudge against a malik of the village because he had enticed away one of his talibs, a beautiful boy of thirteen, and now, instead of the boy spending his days over the Quran and Sheikh Sadi, the Persian poet, he was walking about the village with his eyebrows blackened with antimony and a gold-braided turban on his head, and danced in the malik’s chauk while the village dum played a rebab. Mullah Darweza would dearly have liked the luxury of stabbing the malik himself some dark night, but his profession had to be considered, and what would become of his reputation for sanctity if the story got about, let alone the danger of retaliation, which would mean that he would be a prisoner in his house after dark, and would not be able to go to the mosque to say the night prayers, even if he had not to leave the village altogether?

The Mullah was leading prayers in the mosque that day when his eye fell on Chikki among the worshippers, and as they were leaving the mosque he whispered to him to come to his house that night after the night prayers had been said. What passed there is known only to those two, but Chikki bore away a bag of rupees, and a few nights later, as the malik had gone down to a stream to perform his ablutions before evening prayers, a shot rung out from no one knows where, and the malik, without a cry, fell forward into the stream, and when the villagers arrived and picked him up they found he had been shot through the heart, and no one ever knew who had done it. This windfall whetted Chikki’s appetite, and he soon found this occupation even more lucrative than that of cattle lifting.

As his fame increased, secret commissions came to him from many quarters—from men who had life enemies, but who feared to risk their own lives in ridding themselves of them. With success, however, came danger. Chikki was a marked man, and had to take unusually strict precautions for the preservation of his own life; his repeating rifle was never out of his hand, and no one ever saw him off his guard. He built himself a strong tower, and at night-time retired into this by means of a rope ladder to the upper window (it had no lower windows), then, drawing up the ladder after him, he secured the window. Then came the opportunity of his life. There were two factions in the tribe, the Gur and the Samil, and these had been on bad terms for a long time, but hostilities had so far been confined to a few murders and thefts. Then one day a prominent malik of the Gur faction was shot while on a visit to a Samil village. This could not be atoned for without war, and within twenty-four hours the tocsin of war was beating in every Gur village all over the hills. The Samil replied by burning a Gur village, and soon the whole mountain-side was in arms on one side or the other; desultory warfare was carried on for some time, and much blood had been shed on both sides, but the Samil party lacked a leader. Then they bethought them of Chikki, and sent a deputation, asking him to take their lead. He consented on condition of their recognizing him as paramount chief of the Zaimukhts in the event of success attending his arms. They agreed, and he, collecting together some other soldiers of fortune who had thrown in their lot with him, took the field against the Gur faction. The latter were defeated in several engagements, and finally both sides tired of the fray, and they were all the more ready to come to terms as the harvest was ripe and would spoil if not rapidly gathered in.

Both sides agreed to call a jirgah, which met, drew up conditions of peace acceptable to both sides, and smoked the pipe of peace. The agreement was ratified by a big feast, in which twenty fat dumbas were slain and cooked, with immeasurable quantities of ghi, and a dance, in which the men of the two sides, which had so recently been moving heaven and earth to shoot each other, danced together as though they had never been anything but the greatest of friends all their lives.