A tribute to Zarteef Khan

[Feroz Afridi]

A tribute to Zarteef Khan

دا د چا په لاس او خله مري پښتانه؟
چې په خپل وطن کاله مري پښتانه

نه قاتل او نه مقتول په دے خبر دے
چې دا ولې او په څۀ مري ښتانه

د خپل مړي بدل تل پښتانه اخلي
د پښتون په خاوره نه مري پښتانه

[tor_khan]

Teacher, Human Rights Activist, Social Worker.
Killed 10 December 2011, International Human Rights Day.

[Levanaye Zalmaye]

Just a few kilometers from the municipal limits of Peshawar, Jamrud lies in tribal territory where the law of Pakistan does not hold. Here the Pukhtun code of conduct holds sway with its good face of hospitality and honor and evil one of revenge, mindless killing and gender discrimination. Display of weapons is a matter of pride and education takes a back seat for most people. Following the events of September 2001, Jamrud is virtually in the eye of the storm with miscreants holding sway around it.

Born in this tribal milieu, Zarteef Afridi is peculiar for his pacifism and his commitment to the cause of education. Prevented in 1982 by maternal pressure from going to Soviet Russia for a degree in engineering, he turned to teaching instead. Beginning his career in 1983 he has risen to be the head master in a Jamrud school. When he started out as a teacher, the Afghan jihad, funded by the West, was in full flow and young men from all over the province made their way to the battlefield to either be killed or to become utterly criminalized. While that murderous business was in progress children under the tutelage of the idealistic Zarteef were learning of the reality of the so-called jihad.

Looking back, he can proudly claim that not one of the youngsters who passed through his hands went to the fight. But there are many who have risen to higher education to become college professors and medical practitioners. Some have gone abroad while others have remained in their native land and in their own ways have been useful against the tide of obscurantism.

Disillusioned by the Soviet retreat from Afghanistan, Zarteef found solace by joining Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. His commitment to the cause of human rights was bolstered by this association and he became a vocal advocate of equal rights from and treatment for minorities, women and children. It was, however, his single-handed campaign for the release of dozens of persons rotting in jail under the out-dated Frontier Crimes Regulations that won him the unmitigated respect of the people of Jamrud.

In the mid-1990s Zarteef Afridi coupled his teaching in the morning with activism in the evening from the platform of Democratic Commission for Human Development. Every evening, when the day’s work was done, men gathered in the hujras to smoke the hookah, drink endless cups of green tea and talk. Our man went from hujra to hujra where men invariably discussed the Afghan situation. His take on the issue was divergent from the prevalent view that favored the Pukhtun factions and many of the elders took exception to Zarteef’s views. There was some loss of the ground he had so painstakingly gained thus far.

Meanwhile, dissatisfied with the state of education, the draconian FCR and the lack of adult franchise in FATA, Zarteef founded FATA Education and Welfare Society (FATAEWS) in 1996. Struggling against minds caught in a century-old warp, FATAEWS took it upon itself to educate the community on the imperative of bringing FATA into the network of settled districts and the institution of adult franchise therein. Though this reality is some years in the future, but the first step has been taken. Sooner than later, this demand will become a movement and the out-dated status will crumble. Surely many will then recall the discussions first started in the hujras of Jamrud by Zarteef Afridi’s organization.

Now, with the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan, a corresponding backward slide began in much of the province. The idealistic schoolteacher in Zarteef read the far-reaching effects of this recidivism and came into action. From the FATAEWS platform he launched a campaign in Jamrud, Tirah and Landikotal to educate schoolteachers about the importance of secular education as opposed to a purely madrasa course. Our man was now treading on fairly dangerous ground.

The year 1996 was when FATAEWS came into contact with SAP-PK and joined the RDP training. Without realizing it, he had always been missing an important item of his activist’s repertoire: tact. He admits that teaching children is straightforward business with little use of tact and he, forthright by nature, had never developed it. The RDP training taught him just that – the art of saying even the most unacceptable truth in a manner that does not hurt the listener. ‘From RDP I learned the magic of effective communication,’ he says with a smile. From now on, advocacy was to be the keystone of his NGO’s philosophy.

Back in Jamrud FATAEWS was now a vocal advocate against the ancient Pukhtun custom of vulver – marriage against a bride price. Beginning the campaign, Zarteef ensured that no marriage took place under vulver, first for his own daughters, sisters and nieces, and then for the extended clan. Having set a personal example (he has since wedded off three of his four daughters without receiving a bride price), Zarteef’s efforts have made a huge dent in this out-dated custom.

All this was not without a price, however. The talk of secular education and now action against vulver were bound to raise some ire. Consequently his advocacy for women’s right to vote was met with all-round opposition. Why, as Pukhtuns, they were not willing to indulge in the brazen shamelessness of sending their women out to vote with men. With single-minded focus Zarteef pushed ahead with his agenda, however. The result was a jirga to declare him outside the pale of Islam. It was just as well that before anything untoward could happen, the political agent intervened on his behalf and had the promulgation overturned.

Zarteef’s efforts did not go waste, however. As the anti-vulver drive began from his own family, so too did the campaign to get women to the polling station. The trickle of women voters now seen on polling day in Jamrud, owe much to the fight Zarteef Afridi fought on their behalf. If the attack on vulver and the effort for women’s franchise went so well, it was because Zarteef had started it from his own home. In 1998 the day after his brother’s wedding (contracted without vulver); it was declared that the bride had not been a virgin. Custom decreed that she be returned to her family where, more likely than not, she would be killed for hurting family honor. Learning that the girl had been abused when she was but ten years old, Zarteef retained her in the home and called a jirga to ensure her safety. Thereafter she was wedded elsewhere and has since moved out of Jamrud.

The means of community empowerment was group formation, so Zarteef had learned from RDP. In the years since 1997 he has been the midwife for fifteen registered NGOs and CBOs in and around Jamrud. In the current milieu of the tribal areas with obscurantist forces lurking in the shadows, this is a remarkable upshot. It signals that hope is not dead; it shows that men and women of vision and courage are still prepared to work for progress and development in the face of danger. With a USAID endowment of Rs 800,000 each for organizational strengthening the newly raised groups are on track and working as a cluster with SPO. There focus lies on child rights, democracy and good governance.

Meanwhile, even as it oversaw these new developments, FATAEWS re-registered in 2004. Although never a welfare group working with donations, it now dropped the word from its title and became Association for the Development of Skill, Health and Education (SHADE).

In an area where women’s education did not merit much importance, Zarteef had long been a vocal proponent for it. While he spoke for it in the hujras, he had a somewhat covert operation in progress within the homes as well. His training as an electrician and expertise in this field frequently took him into people’s homes. As he worked on their electrical appliances, he shamed the women of the household for their illiteracy. He says that over the years, this surreptitious campaign made for an increase in girls’ enrollment in schools, as well as that, it prepared older women for school.

When the ground was ready, SHADE got seven adult literacy centers from NCHD. Sprinkled in villages around Jamrud, these centers cater for women between the ages of seventeen and sixty-five who have never been to school. The years of surreptitious advocacy by Zarteef paid and though meant for about thirty students each, these schools now cater to more than three times as many. Today there are a total of seven hundred and fifty women in these centers with many showing the promise of going on to high school.

The earliest campaign of FATAEWS had been against FCR and for the expansion of the political parties order to the tribal areas. The presidential decree of 14 August 2009 against the old order vindicates this long-standing demand. In the tribal area of Jamrud the presidential ruling would have gone mostly unnoticed.

Led by SHADE, the cluster of fifteen organizations came into play and plastered the walls of Jamrud sub-division with chalking for support to the presidential declaration in favor amalgamation of the tribal areas with the rest of the country. Corner meetings and media coverage reinforced the campaign and today there is a strong realization that the major ills of the tribal areas rise from the peculiarity of never being governed by the laws of Pakistan. The tribal areas of Pakistan may well be on the way to get the rights long denied them by vested interest. As Zarteef Afridi and his SHADE have so much to do with women’s education and franchise in Jamrud, it will have a hand in this great revolutionizing step when it comes to pass.

Source





Truth be told, I didn't know Zarteef Khan Afridi was until I read about his death in the newspaper a couple of days ago. But that's our fault as Pashtuns - we have a history of ignoring or rejecting the benefactors of our nation.

It makes you wonder what sort of an animal would want to kill a man like Zarteef, who devoted his entire life to the betterment of his own people.

Dasay sur Pukhtun da punjapyano ao da hagho Talib malgaro stargay laka azhgi khugawi, zka ye nashi zghamalay.

[Dervaish]

Personalities like Zarteef Khan are the true LEADERS in a nation. He brought changes, and the movement he has started, it will spread. There will be more Leaders. They will keep coming forward. To change centuries old evils, won't happen over night. The hardest part is, to initiate and make rolling a movement. Zarteef Khan has done that. Allah bless his soul.