Every province in Pakistan wants freedom from the Army’s tyranny: Why Balochistan, Sindh, and Gilgit-Baltistan may separate from the Islamic Republic in future

The Islamic Republic of Pakistan, which recently triggered military hostilities with India after sponsoring cross-border terrorism that resulted in the Pahalgam terror attack, is grappling with growing calls for independence coming out of its different provinces. The country, which also struggles with an acute economic crisis, is finding it difficult to curb secessionist tendencies at home.

The Sindhi, Baloch and Pashtun minorities communities in Pakistan have long been demanding freedom from Pakistan and the creation of their respective independent states. These minority communities have long faced persecution and systematic discrimination by the Pakistan’s military establishment.

Amid recent military confrontations between India and Pakistan, the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) reignited their freedom movement against Pakistan’s government and declared independence. This was followed by calls of freedom from the Sindh province of Pakistan. The Jeay Sindhu Freedom Movement (JSFM), political group that demands the creation of separate country of Sindhu Desh by liberating the Sindh province from Pakistan, has also intensified its freedom movement against the Pakistani government.

In addition to that, voices demanding a separate country of Pashtunistan have emerged from the areas historically comprising the Pashtun homeland, including parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and northern Balochistan.

Balochistan Freedom Movement

Amid the military hostilities between India and Pakistan, the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) declared independence from Pakistan and urged the United Nations to recognise the Democratic Republic of Pakistan. Balochistan, which has a rich reservoir of natural resources, is a sparsely populated area inhabited by the Baloch ethnic group. The region has been struggling with militancy for a long time.

Historically, Balochistan was an independent entity under the Khan of Kalat. However, it acceeded to Pakistan in March 1948 under coercion following the British withdrawal. An instrument of accession was signed by the Khan of Kalat under pressure and against his own will and the will of the Baloch people. Prior to that, a Standstill Agreement was signed between Kalat and Pakistan on August 11, 1947, under British supervision, recognising Kalat as an independent state. Kalat was the name given to what is now known as Balochistan. However, in 1948, Pakistan forced the Khan to merge Balochistan into Pakistan. Pakistan wanted Balochistan to be merged into its federation. 

Since the merger, five major insurgencies—1948, 1958, 1962, 1973-77 and the ongoing conflict since the early 2000s, have erupted, driven by grievances of the Baloch people over political marginalisation, violent and torturous suppression and resource exploitation. The Baloch freedom movement is now being led by the BLA which has been brutal suppression at the hands of the Pakistani regime which has been killing their leadership and members under its ‘Kill and Dump’ policy that began in 2009.

Demands for a separate state of Sindh

The calls for freedom of the Sindh province of Pakistan are being spearheaded by the Jeay Sindhu Freedom Movement (JSFM) which has been advocating for the formation of a separate state of Sindhu Desh. It has been a long-standing demand of the people of Sindh to have a separate, independent state of Sindh. The minority Sindhi community has accused the Islamic state of Pakistan of erasing their local culture through systematic oppression such as the imposition of Urdu language and land grabbing. Several pro-freedom activists have been killed, tortured and forcibly disappeared by the military establishment of Pakistan over the years.

Pashtun homeland of Pashtunistan

Pashtuns are the second-largest ethnic group in Pakistan after Punjabis. They form 15% of the total population of Pakistan. The community has been demanding an independent state because of state-backed discrimination and persecution. The Pashtun community lives in the Pashtunistan region which partly falls in Pakistan and partly in Afghanistan. Both Pakistan and Afghan Pashtuns have opposed and rejected the 1893 demarcation known as the Durand line.

In recent times, the freedom movement of the Pashtun community has been spearheaded by the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM). The PTM, formed as a civil rights movement, emerged as a response to State-enforced terrorism and human rights abuses of Pakistan’s army and intelligence agencies in the Pashtun Belt of Pakistan including enforced disappearances, extrajudicial killings. 

Resistance in Gilgit Baltistan

The Pakistani military regime has been facing resistence from the ethnic communities living in Gilgit-Baltistan which forms part of the PoK. The region, blessed with natural geographical beauty, has been neglected by the Pakistani government. Gilgit Baltistan is a strategically significant region as it is surrounded by Afghanistan’s Wakhan Corridor to the north, China’s Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region to the north-west, Ladakh to east, and Kashmir to south. 

However, the people living in the region are forced to live a life full of hardships due to the negligence of the Pakistani government. The region lacks basic facilities as well as development. The locals have accused the Pakistani Army of illegally occupying their lands.

The Islamic Republic of Pakistan which was created after dividing India on religious grounds, has numerous faultlines which have become prominent over time. The various ethnic communities living in its four provinces have face consistently suffered oppression as the country is not run by a representative government but by its military which is guided by rigid Islamic principles.

Facing the real threat of extinction at the hands of the Pakistani Military, a sizeable chunk of all these ethnic communities be it Sindhi, Baloch, Pashtun, or those in the FATA region or in Gilgit Baltistan, have taken up arms against the Pakistani army to fight for their rights and seek freedom for these regions. The Pakistan military regime has a history of suppressing the culture and language of ethnic minorities and imposing a made-up Islamic indentity. Similar oppressive measures were implemented by the Pakistani regime against the Bengali people living in the East Pakistan which led to the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War and the formation of and independent country of Bangladesh. With the rising calls for independence emerging from different provinces of Pakistan, history might repeat itself soon.

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