Mullahs and wars in Tribal Areas
By Khaled Ahmed in
the Daily Times
BOOK REVIEW: Mullahs
and wars in Tribal Areas
Frontier of Faith:
Islam in the Indo-Afghan Borderland;
By Sana Haroon;
Hurst & Company London 2007;
Pp254; Price £25;
Special Price
£15.95;
Available at
bookstores in Pakistan
The piri-muridi
tradition was strong among the Pakhtuns till another great man in the tradition
of Naqshbandiya-Mujaddadiya chain became their patron in chief, Shah Waliullah.
The big tradition of the warlord mullah in the Tribal Areas must begin with
Abdul Ghafur (1793-1878) of upper Swat who got his early education at Hazrat Ji
of the Mujaddadiya silsila in Peshawar who found him in violation of the tariqa,
after which he joined a Qadiri-Suhrawardiya-Chistiya teacher of a multiple
order. Ghafur became the akhund whose line was to be the owners of Swat because
he fought on the side of Amir Dost of Afghanistan against Ranjit Singh and won
for his Yusufzai followers the lands of Swat and Mardan. The ‘Miangul’
descendants of Ghafur were first known as akhund but were later called wali.
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