Of the Cantonments and British Sahibs

(Peshawar Saddar Tarikh Kei Aine Mein - Peshawar cantonment through the mirror of history) by Imran Rasheed Imran. Shah Book Store, Saddar Bazaar, Peshawar Cantonment. Price Rs. 350, US $10).

There has been renewed interest in the history of the North West Frontier of Pakistan in recent years. The old musty books have been dusted off and brought back to life in new prints. Most of these books were written, often in a self-serving manner, by the British officers and administrators to chronicle events along the turbulent Frontier. Peshawar being the most important town at the crossroads of Asia features rather prominently in all such writings.

Imran Rasheed Imran, a young Peshawari journalist, has written a 380-page book on the history of Peshawar Cantonment. It is an interesting book that provides a concise account of the building of Peshawar Cantonment in the marshland west of the old walled city in 1849.

Building cantonments was a peculiar British phenomenon in Indian Subcontinent. Whenever the British occupied new territory, they built new garrison towns near the old cities and called them cantonments. These were special enclaves where they built barracks, bungalows, churches, clubs and cemeteries. The architecture of these cantonments was European with little or no attention to native traditions. Though there were no written laws banishing the locals from these towns, in practice the locals were not allowed to live there. Except for a handful of influential natives, who were granted special permission to built homes on leased land, most others were either shopkeepers or domestic servants and as such were not allowed to own property. The comings and goings into the cantonments of natives was strictly controlled. At the end of the day domestic servant s - the cooks, the bearers, the sweepers and the sais’s (liverymen) - were required to return either to their homes in nearby villages or to the old city. In due course small segregated colonies were built within the confines of the cantonments for such help. These colonies were called “Lal Kurti” after the red jackets the bearers and attendants were required to wear while at work. For all intent and purpose this was an apartheid system. Peshawar cantonment was modeled after other cantonments that the British had built throughout the Indian subcontinent.

All this and much more is chronicled in the book under review. There are separate chapters that deal with the concept of cantonments, the building of Peshawar cantonment, its architecture, and the main characters that played part in its development, the building of various educational and religious institutions. The book starts with a comprehensive chronological listing of events and landmarks that were important in the development of Peshawar cantonment. It begins with the arrival in Peshawar of the first British envoy to the court of Shah Shujah of Afghanistan in 1809. At that time Peshawar served as winter capital of Afghan kings and it was in the Bala Hisar Fort that Monstuart Elphinstone, the envoy, presented his credentials to the Afghan king. Other landmark events in the list include arrival of the Sikhs in 1823 and the arrival of the British forces under the command of Walter Gilbert (later Sir Walter Gilbert) in 1849 and the start soon thereafter of the cantonment. The list goes on to chronicle subsequent history of the cantonment encompassing 153 years.

The book is not free of flaws. The most serious and flagrant flaw is the way some Pakistani journalists and writers report news or write history. There are frequent expressions of negative personal opinion on events and personalities that have long past. Such editorializing, if at all necessary, should be in footnotes and not in the main body of the text. Unfortunately some writers cannot differentiate between critiquing history with an open mind and expressing their own opinion based on deep prejudices. A book of history is no place for sarcasm.

Similarly, the author shows an obvious bias against pre-partition prominent Hindus of Peshawar. For example, Mehr Chand Khanna, a well-known and widely respected civic leader and builder of many institutions, is dealt with rather unkindly just because he was a Hindu. It is the same Mr. Khanna who after migration to India in 1947 held the portfolio of refugee settlement in Indian government. There were many others who contributed to the development of Peshawar City and Peshawar Cantonment and in all fairness they should not be denigrated but acknowledged for their contributions. In Peshawar of yore there was great amity between Muslims and other religious minorities, including Hindus, Sikhs and Jews. On balance they were no more prejudiced or biased than their Muslim counterparts.

The book has a number of vintage photographs and sketches that add richness to the story. Unfortunately the quality of reproduction is rather poor and there is no mention of the source of individual photographs.

There is one more omission, not a glaring one but one of personal interest to me. The author while discussing the development of medical institutions in Peshawar states that heart surgery in Peshawar’s Lady Reading Hospital was started in 1994. While it is true that open-heart surgery came to Peshawar in 1994, the foundations of heart surgery, however, were laid almost 20 years earlier when closed heart surgery was regularly performed in early 70’s in that hospital. I should know for it was my good fortune (at the time it appeared as misfortune) to start cardiac surgery in Peshawar when I was on the faculty of Khyber Medical College at that time. This book is a noteworthy and praiseworthy effort by a promising young Pakistani writer. Despite some of the flaws the book is well researched and well written. It is a notable addition to the increasing list of books about Peshawar and the Frontier and should be a valuable reference book for all those who are interested in the history of the era. One does not have to be from Peshawar to enjoy this book.

(S. Amjad Hussain is a professor of surgery and an op-ed page columnist for the daily Toledo Blade. He is the author of four books on Peshawar, including a 1993 book ‘A Brief History of the Frontier Town of Peshawar’. E-Mail: aghaji@buckeye-express.com).