By Dr.Sarfaraz Khan
Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa is home to the world-wide famous Gandhara civilization. Several locations that are witnesses to this long-forgotten culture are Peshawar, Dir, Buner and Swat beside Taxila (in the Punjab) and Bamiyan and Hadda (in Afghanistan). Unfortunately, this heritage has been steadily disappearing because of man-made and environmental reasons.
A recent threat in this regard is the construction of the long awaited mega-project of Swat Expressway, re-christened as Swat Motorway. The work has already started. It is rather interesting to note that the route selected by the executors of the mega-project follows the footsteps of old pilgrims and traders. The Expressway, when completed will be along the historic and shortest path also used in antiquity. The Swat Motorway can also serve in helping promote the archaeological cultural heritage of the region and in highlighting the threats to the cultural heritage that lie along it route.
When the project is finished, a large number of archaeological sites of the Gandhara Civilization will be accessible through one high road via one of the six interchanges. By using Karnal Sher Khan Interchange (KSKI) to turn to the new route from Islamabad-Peshawar Motorway or vice versa, future pilgrims/scholars/visitors/tourists will find themselves within a constellation of Gandhara Civilization sites and will be able to visit within minutes any archaeological heritage site in the heartland of ancient Gandhara.
Every interchange is an opening to a panorama of historical and archaeological background, ready to assuage the thirst of all those pilgrims/scholars who may opt to enter the area through one of these interchanges. For example Dhubian interchange provides an easy entrée point to the ancient town of Salatura (Chota/Wrokay Lahore), the birth place of Sanskrit Grammarian and father of modern linguistics, Panini, and the Bakhshalay interchange gives pilgrims/scholars easy access to the discovery spot of Bakhshali Manuscript, a documented evidence that people in this part of the world were familiar with basic mathematics in antiquity.
Cultural Heritage Sites and Swat Motorway
The speeches at the inaugural ceremony talked about tourist spots in Swat valley; however, any reference to the cultural heritage sites and monuments alongside the proposed route was totally absent from these speeches and in fact is absent from the general discourse in the country. By a happy chance, cultural heritage monuments and sites will be accessible to local and non-local pilgrims/scholars as these sites will be at a walking distance from the builders of the route are following the route used in antiquity.
The initiative of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Government has resulted (by choice or by default) in an 81-kilometers-long heritage corridor, which has been termed in this article as Gandhara Cultural Heritage Corridor (GCHC) for convenience. However, the big task ahead for the provincial Government is to engage civil society, scholars and international community to preserve, and conserve the archaeological cultural heritage for posterity.
The Provincial Government should demonstrate its true commitment and dedication to its declaration it made at the inauguration ceremony that the route will end the isolation of the area, especially in the context of the archaeological monuments of the region. Keeping in view the desolate condition of archaeology in this corridor, it will be advisable to engage society in general and academia in particular to ponder on those sites/monuments which are in dire need of preservation, conservation and promotion at national as well as international level.
One of the many aims, of engaging the academia and society, will be an active vigilance against illegal diggers/antiquities hunters and prospective builders in order to preserve archaeological heritage sites located alongside the ancient/new route (GCHC). Since 1955, the Italian Archaeological Mission to Pakistan has systematically excavated several sites of Swat’s Gandharan Cultural Heritage. The efforts of the Italian archaeologists and scholars have resulted in the preservation and conservation of several sites in the valley.
In contrast to archaeological sites in Swat, the picture in the GCHC is dismal because this region came under direct British rule in the second half of the 19th century. A majority of the sites have been opened in search of cultural materials and were subject to non-systematic excavations save two or three sites. In the post partition era, the Japanese Archaeological Mission to Pakistan explored and excavated sites in the GCHC in 1960s and onward but failed in efforts at conservation and preservation. The sites of Chanaka-dherai, Mekha-Sanda and Thareli even fail to qualify for the list of Khandarat which is a common and popular parlance for cultural heritage monuments in Pakistan.
The past negligence may be rectified by present day commitment and earnest effort to safeguard cultural heritage sites in the GCHC from total annihilation to reveal a peaceful and tolerant depiction of Pakistani society who own material and non-material culture originated and developed on the land of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Dr. Rafiullah Khan, assistant professor in the Taxila institute of Asian civilizations, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad is of the opinion that cultural tourism will boost a positive image of the country in the international community. He says “Besides being a source of income generation, cultural tourism, for countries like Pakistan, can contribute to the process of positive image building and cultural projection”. Nonetheless, advocates of cultural heritage management and cultural tourism have been at odd with each other.
Apart from other institutions of the province, Directorate of Archaeology and Museums (DAM), Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa should remain on high alert till the completion of the route because it is a Mega Construction Project which needs large quantity of filling and other material (soil and stones) and related products from the nearby mountains. Of all sites located in GCHC, the Chanaka-dherai site is in the Red Zone in terms of high risk and threat of annihilation, due to two reasons. Firstly, its excavation by Japanese Archaeological Mission in 1960s was not followed by any proper preservation, conservation and restoration, so the site fails to even present the picture of a Khandar. It is no more than a pile of mud and stone the means nothing to anyone save an expert archaeologist. Secondly, it is too near the new route (less than 500 metres) and will become an easy prey of the contractors as was the fate of bricks from Harappa, a 3rd millennium BCE site of the Indus Civilization. The British contractors of the Karachi-Lahore section ruthlessly used the bricks for the embankment for the railway track in the 19th century during the East India Company’s reign.
Apart from the locality of Shahbaz-garhi, a number of archaeological sites in the Pajja Hills will also be under high risk because the Pajja Hills is the only source of mining for many construction material. So archaeological sites in these hills should be kept on continuous vigilance lest any site may disappear.
Accidental discovery of cultural heritage sites cannot be ruled out as happened during the construction of Ghazi-Barotha Hydal Power Project previously, because the proposed route of Swat Motorway is following the ancient pilgrim and trade route which passes through the heartland of ancient Gandhara with its rich history for pre-Islamic cultural heritage. So for salvage excavations of accidental discovered sites or monuments, DAM should be in close liaison with the principal contractor, Frontier Works Organization (FWO), especially during construction related activities in the locality of Shahbaz-garha, Bakhshalay, Sawaldher, Koi-Barmol, Palai, Pirana, Zulamkot and onward up to Chakdara interchange.
After completion of the project, DAM and Ministry of Culture and Tourism should establish site or camp offices at each interchange for the facilitation and guidance of intended pilgrims and scholars who visit cultural heritage site in the region. These offices should be staffed by qualified guides, well versed in the history, culture, traditions, folk literature and archaeological importance of the Cultural Heritage Corridor in particular and overall Gandhara in general. Academia should be engaged to write comprehensive monographs and pamphlets about the history, culture, traditions, folklore and archaeology of the region termed in this article as Gandharan Cultural Heritage Corridor and every interchange should be equipped with these sources. Moreover, at every interchange and cultural heritage site, signboards with core information at a glance should be installed for the ready reference of the intended pilgrims and scholars on the pattern of cultural heritage sites at Taxila. These measures will eliminate isolation of the area and will boost academic, cultural, religious, political and economic interaction of the inhabitants with the national and international community. It will pay a positive role to showcase and display the province in particular and Pakistan in general as an enlightened, progressive and tolerant land ever ready to cooperate with international community for the promotion of cultural interaction and exchange. However, on the part of the state, all these measures will demand firm commitment to ensure peaceful environment free of radicalism and terrorism in the whole country in general and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa in particular.
Like China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, Swat Motorway will be rechristened with the passage of time as Corridor of Gandhara Cultural Heritage and will prove fruitful for cultural tourism of the region in near future. Last but not the least, the Government should work in close consultation with academia to declare this new route a “Cultural Heritage” on the pattern of Silk Road/Route, because the new route actually is along the an ancient pilgrimage and trade route.
