Kurram Valley
Encyclopedia
Kurram tribal agency is located in the FATA area of Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

. Geographically it covers Kurram Valley which is a beautiful valley in the northwestern part of Pakistan neighboring Afghanistan.

Until the year 2000, when divisions were abolished, the Kurram District used to be part of the Peshawar Division
Peshawar Division
Peshawar Division was an administrative division of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan until the reforms of 2000 abolished the third tier of government. At independence in 1947, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was split into two divisions, Dera Ismail Khan and Peshawar...

 of the North-West Frontier Province
North-West Frontier Province
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa , formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province and various other names, is one of the four provinces of Pakistan, located in the north-west of the country...

 of Pakistan.

Description

The name Kurram comes from the river Kurram which flows along the valley. The valley in the north is surrounded by snow-covered or 'White' Mountains (the Safed Koh) which also forms the natural border with Afghanistan.

The Kurram River drains the southern flanks of the Safed Koh
Safed Koh
Spin Ghar or Safed Kuh or the Indian Caucasus, also known as the Safīd Mountain Range or Morga Range, is a mountain range on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, up to above sea-level at Mount Sikaram, straight and rigid, towering above all surrounding hills...

 mountain range, and enters the Indus
Indus River
The Indus River is a major river which flows through Pakistan. It also has courses through China and India.Originating in the Tibetan plateau of western China in the vicinity of Lake Mansarovar in Tibet Autonomous Region, the river runs a course through the Ladakh district of Jammu and Kashmir and...

 plains north of Bannu
Bannu
Bannu is the principal city of the Bannu District in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan. It is an important road junction and market city. Bannu is a very old city, founded in ancient times; however, the present location of the downtown Bannu was founded by Sir Herbert Edwardes in 1848,...

. It flows west to east and crosses the Paktia Province
Paktia Province
Paktia , is one of the thirty-four provinces of Afghanistan, in the east of the country. Its capital is Gardez. The population is predominantly Pashtun.- History:...

 Afghan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

-Pakistan border at about 80 km southwest of Jalalabad
Jalalabad
Jalalabad , formerly called Adinapour, as documented by the 7th century Hsüan-tsang, is a city in eastern Afghanistan. Located at the junction of the Kabul River and Kunar River near the Laghman valley, Jalalabad is the capital of Nangarhar province. It is linked by approximately of highway with...

, and joins the Indus near Isa Khel after a course of more than 320 km (198.8 mi). The district has an area of 3310 km² (1,278 sq mi); the population according to the 1998 census was 448,310. It lies between the Miranzai Valley
Miranzai Valley
The Miranzai Valley, also Hangu, is a mountainous valley situated in the Kohat and Hangu districts in the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan. It is made up of two valleys, draining from the southwest into the Kunam and northeast into the Kohat Tai. It is divided into upper and lower...

 and the Afghan border, and is inhabited by Turi
Turi
The Turi or Torai inhabit the Kurram Valley, in Kurram Agency, Federally Administered Tribal Areas, Pakistan. They speak Pashto and practice the Twelver Shia sect of Islam.-Pre-Imperial history:...

 Pashtuns
Pashtun people
Pashtuns or Pathans , also known as ethnic Afghans , are an Eastern Iranic ethnic group with populations primarily between the Hindu Kush mountains in Afghanistan and the Indus River in Pakistan...

, a sect of Turki
Turki
The Turki language is a Türkic literary language active from the 13th to the 19th centuries, used by different Türkic peoples...

 (Turkish origins) on the western and central side who are supposed to have subjugated the Bangash
Bangash
Bangash is the name of a Pashtun clan. The Bangash clan inhabit regions within the Federally Administered Tribal Areas , the Kurram Agency, the Miranzai Valley bordering the Samana Range, Naryab, Tirah, Kohat and Peshawar within the Sarhad province...

 about six hundred years ago. The majority of the population is Pashto-speaking, but unlike most Pashtuns they are Twelver Shiites. The eastern portion of the valley is inhabited mostly by Sunnite Pashtuns, mainly of the Jaji, Mangal
Mangal
Mangal is the name for Turkish barbecue. In a more social context, it resembles braai of South Africa.Mangal is popular in Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Israel, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and countries in the Levant...

, Paras and the remnants of the Bangash clans.

History

The Kurram Valley in ancient times offered the most direct route to Kabul
Kabul
Kabul , spelt Caubul in some classic literatures, is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. It is also the capital of the Kabul Province, located in the eastern section of Afghanistan...

 and Gardez. The route crossed the Gavi [[Jaji]] [[Aryob]] pass 3,439 m (11,283 ft) high, just over 20 km west of modern Parachinar
Parachinar
Parachinar is the capital of Kurram Agency, FATA of Pakistan. It is about 290 km west of the capital, Islamabad...

, but was blocked by snow for several months of the year.

The valley is highly irrigated, well-peopled, and crowded with small fortified villages, orchards and groves, to which a fine background is afforded by the dark pine forests and alpine snows of the Safed Koh. The beauty and climate of the valley attracted some of the Mughal
Mughal Empire
The Mughal Empire ,‎ or Mogul Empire in traditional English usage, was an imperial power from the Indian Subcontinent. The Mughal emperors were descendants of the Timurids...

 emperors of Delhi, and the remains exist of a garden planted by Shah Jahan
Shah Jahan
Shah Jahan Shah Jahan (also spelled Shah Jehan, Shahjehan, , Persian: شاه جهان) (January 5, 1592 – January 22, 1666) Shah Jahan (also spelled Shah Jehan, Shahjehan, , Persian: شاه جهان) (January 5, 1592 – January 22, 1666) (Full title: His Imperial Majesty Al-Sultan al-'Azam wal Khaqan...

.
According to the Gazetteer of Kurram, the richness of the land gradually weaned the Turks
Turkish people
Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...

 from their nomadic life. Sections built villages and settled permanently; they ceased to be Kuchi and became Kothi this abandonment of their nomadic habits by the majority of the resulted, as it was bound to do, in a contraction of the area in effective possession. The upper Kurram plain was safe as their head-quarters, but hills and slopes below the Safed Koh
Safed Koh
Spin Ghar or Safed Kuh or the Indian Caucasus, also known as the Safīd Mountain Range or Morga Range, is a mountain range on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, up to above sea-level at Mount Sikaram, straight and rigid, towering above all surrounding hills...

 and Mandher over which their graziers had kept an efficient watch, now afforded a menace as a place in which an encroaching tribe could established itself. To guard against this settlements of Mangals and Muqbols were half invited half allowed to push themselves in conditions of vassalage, and on promise to afford a buttress against any enemy aggression. In the lower Kurram, where for climatic reasons candidates for settlements were fewer, the problem was not easily solved. The Chardi Turis seem to have been the first to abandon their nomadic life.As the numbers who went down to graze every year became less,the area under control contracted. Sangroba and Hadmela were left far behind and as the Turis receded the Watizai Zaimushts gradually pushed in, until all that was left was a settlement at and about Alizai. On the western side the Saragallas retained, and still largely retain their habits. They too put in settlements around Biliamin and after much intervening warfare had finally to admit Bangashes brother not as vassals, but for the rest they retain unimpaired the rights on the western bank which they acquired at the time the conquest.

With Chardis this was for from being the course left unsupported by their Kuchis they maintained a precarious existence at Alizai until even then they had to give three-fifths of their land to the Watizai Zaimushts in return for their assistance in a feud they had entered upon with Bilyamin. Consequently the hills and the grazing grounds passed from the Turizun to the Zaimushtzun and as the other Zaimushts section being unopposed had settled themselves on the left bank below Sadda.

In the early 19th century the Kurram Valley was under the government of Kabul
Kabul
Kabul , spelt Caubul in some classic literatures, is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. It is also the capital of the Kabul Province, located in the eastern section of Afghanistan...

, and every five or six years a military expedition was sent to collect the revenue, the soldiers living meanwhile at free quarters on the people. It was not until about 1848 that the Turis were brought directly under the control of Kabul, when a governor was appointed, who established himself in Kurram. The Turis, being Shiah Muslims, never liked the Afghan rule.

During the second Afghan War, when Sir Frederick Roberts
Frederick Roberts, 1st Earl Roberts
Field Marshal Frederick Sleigh Roberts, 1st Earl Roberts, Bt, VC, KG, KP, GCB, OM, GCSI, GCIE, KStJ, PC was a distinguished Indian born British soldier who regarded himself as Anglo-Irish and one of the most successful British commanders of the 19th century.-Early life:Born at Cawnpore, India, on...

 advanced by way of the Kurram Valley and the Peiwar Kotal to Kabul, the Turis lent him every assistance in their power, and in consequence their independence was granted them in 1880.

The administration of the Kurram Valley was finally rendered to British authorities, at the request of the Turis themselves, in 1890. Technically it ranked, not as a British district, but as an agency or administered area.

Two expeditions in the Kurram Valley also require mention:
(1) The Kurram expedition of 1856 under Brigadier-General Sir Neville Chamberlain. The Turis, on the first annexation of the Kohat district by the British, had repeatedly leagued with other tribes to infest the Miranzai valley, harbouring fugitives, encouraging resistance, and frequently attacking Bangash and Khattak villages in the Kohat
Kohat
Kohat is a medium sized town in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. It is located at 33°35'13N 71°26'29E with an altitude of 489 metres and is the capital of Kohat District. The town centres around a British-era fort, various bazaars, and a military cantonment. A British-built narrow gauge...

 district. Accordingly, in 1856 British forces numbering 4,896 troops traversed their country, and the tribe entered into engagements for future good conduct.
(2) The Kohat-Kurram expedition of 1897 under Colonel W. Hill. During the frontier risings of 1897 the inhabitants of the Kurram valley, chiefly the Massozai section of the Orakzai
Orakzai
Orakzai is a Pashtun tribe settled in the Orakzai Agency of Pakistan. It consists of eighteen clans. Most of the members are situated in the North West Frontier Province of Pakistan.-Location:...

s, were infected by the general excitement, and attacked the British camp at Sadda
Sadda, FATA
Sadda is a the second large town in Kurram Agency. It is a big trade market for the people of lower kurram and central kurram. During the Soviet-Afghan War it was known for its mujahideen training camps set up by Ustad Abdur Rab Sayyaf.-Demographics:...

 and other posts. A force of 14,230 British troops traversed the country, and the tribesmen were severely punished. In Lord Curzon's reorganization of the frontier in 1900-1901, British troops were withdrawn from the forts in the Kurram Valley, and were replaced by the Kurram militia, reorganized in two battalions, and chiefly drawn from the Turi tribe.

In recent years the Kurram Valley has once again assumed a very strategic position and the site of intense Taliban activities. The armed forces of Pakistan extended their major offensive against Al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda is a global broad-based militant Islamist terrorist organization founded by Osama bin Laden sometime between August 1988 and late 1989. It operates as a network comprising both a multinational, stateless army and a radical Sunni Muslim movement calling for global Jihad...

 and Taliban elements in FATA
Fata
The FATA or FC-ATA is a type of computer hard disk drive. FATA is simply the low cost ATA or SATA disk drive equipped with a small external converter, that changes the interface to Fibre Channel...

 dubbed Operation Rah-e-Nijat
Operation Rah-e-Nijat
The Operation Rah-e-Nijat was a Pakistani military operation against the Taliban and other Islamist rebels in the South Waziristan area of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas that began on June 19, 2009; a major ground offensive was subsequently launched on October 17...

 to Kurram in December 2009.

Archeological findings

Ahmad Hasan Dani
Ahmad Hasan Dani
Professor Ahmad Hasan Dani FRAS, SI, HI , was a Pakistani intellectual, archaeologist, historian, and linguist. He was among the foremost authorities on Central Asian and South Asian archaeology and history. He introduced archaeology as a discipline in higher education in Pakistan and Bangladesh...

 has recorded several findings in the North Waziristan
North Waziristan
North Waziristan is the northern part of Waziristan, a mountainous region of northwest Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan and covering . Waziristan comprises the area west and south-west of Peshawar between the Tochi river to the north and the Gomal river to the south, forming part of Pakistan's...

 area.

Administrative divisions

  • Upper Kurram Agency.
  • Lower Kurram Agency.
  • Central Kurram Agency.

Parachinar Cantonment

Parachinar
Parachinar
Parachinar is the capital of Kurram Agency, FATA of Pakistan. It is about 290 km west of the capital, Islamabad...

 is the administrative head quarter of Kurram valley. It has offices of political agent, levy, and Kurram Militia, a part of the Frontier Corps (FC). It is located northwest of the valley. This makes it a part of Upper Kurram.
The name of Parachinar comes from 'Para', one of the tribes of the valley and 'Chinar', the maple trees which are found in abundance in Kurram value in general and Parachinar in particular. the old name of Parchinar is Tutki, when Kurram was apart of Afghanistan. And the inhabitants of Tutki are called Tutkiwal even still the Afghan people called it Tutki.
The town of Parachinar has population around seventy thousand predominantly Turi
Turi
The Turi or Torai inhabit the Kurram Valley, in Kurram Agency, Federally Administered Tribal Areas, Pakistan. They speak Pashto and practice the Twelver Shia sect of Islam.-Pre-Imperial history:...

 and Jaji. The town has government hospital and many government schools.

Major Towns

  1. Parachinar
    Parachinar
    Parachinar is the capital of Kurram Agency, FATA of Pakistan. It is about 290 km west of the capital, Islamabad...

    the headquarter of kurram agency.
  2. Sadda
    Sadda, FATA
    Sadda is a the second large town in Kurram Agency. It is a big trade market for the people of lower kurram and central kurram. During the Soviet-Afghan War it was known for its mujahideen training camps set up by Ustad Abdur Rab Sayyaf.-Demographics:...

    the second large town in kurram agency.
  3. Alizai the second tehsil and third big town in kurram agency.
  4. pirqayoom
  5. sateen
  6. Karman
  7. Peiwar
  8. Makhi zai
  9. Baggan
  10. Dogar
  11. Bagzai
  12. Kunj Ali Zai
  13. Tari Mangal
  14. Boshehra
  15. Malikhel
  16. kochi village

Number of Tehsils

There are three tehsils in the Kurram Agency.
  1. Parachinar
    Parachinar
    Parachinar is the capital of Kurram Agency, FATA of Pakistan. It is about 290 km west of the capital, Islamabad...

  2. Sadda
    Sadda, FATA
    Sadda is a the second large town in Kurram Agency. It is a big trade market for the people of lower kurram and central kurram. During the Soviet-Afghan War it was known for its mujahideen training camps set up by Ustad Abdur Rab Sayyaf.-Demographics:...

  3. Alizai

Major Dams

Kurram Agency has a few water reservoirs locally called Dams. Basically these are water supply schemes for domestic purposes. No hydroelectric power is generated in these constructions nor are they used for irrigation purpose.

Malana dam

Located in the north of Parachinar town this dam was constructed in 1991. Most of the population of Parachinar town depend on this reservoir and the dam is famous among the locals as a picnic resort. A guest house is built here by the Agency administration.

Zeran dam

Zeran dam is located to the north-east of Prachinar. It is also famous for its scenic beauty. This reservoir served water for Parachinar town before the construction of Malana dam, still the dam contributes much water to a large part of the town Parachinar.

Kot Ragha Dam Malikhel

This is a small size reservoir, largest in the kurram, and was built in Kot Ragha(Malikhel). It contains about 70,000 fishes and has capacity to provide water about 2500 km² area.

Climate

Climate of the valley remains pleasant most of the summer however in winters minimum temperature is usually below freezing point, occasionally mercury drop below -10 degree Celsius. Parachinar is ranked the fourth coldest location in Pakistan
Pakistan
Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 by the weather charts website "Climate-Charts" that uses data available from the World Meteorological Organization
World Meteorological Organization
The World Meteorological Organization is an intergovernmental organization with a membership of 189 Member States and Territories. It originated from the International Meteorological Organization , which was founded in 1873...

.
Northern and western heights of the valley receive snow falls in winters. Much of the precipitations occur during spring and summer season. Autumn and winter are usually dry.

Taliban Activity

The Taliban though succeeded in establishing their rule in parts of Kurram Valley in recent years exploiting the existing secterian schism, nonetheless the area proved to be not less than a nightmare for extremist elements. On several occasions the Tribesmen especially Turis hit back at Al Qaeda and Taliban elements with considerable effectiveness.

On August 31, 2008 tribesmen mostly Turis dislodged Taliban from nearly 200 villages finally Taliban headquarters at Bagzai fell to the tribesmen killing as many as 95 militants. Independent sources reported elders of Lower Kurram to have lost their authority to a band of displaced people of their sect from Parachinar and Taliban militants, mostly from other tribal regions.

Extremist Groups in Kurram Agency

In recent years, since about 1985, the Kurram Agency has become increasingly victimized by sectarian violence as tensions grew between Shia and Sunni of the Kurram Agency, the later supported by Taliban, Al-Qaeda and various other local and foreign groups. Recently Extremist groups from outside the area have taken hold and imposing fundamentalist version of Islam on all residents,numerous cases of taliban assassinating Shia and Sunni tribal Elders. Reportedly Turi tribesmen captured and sacked more than 42 villages from the Talibans. Today several foreign armed sectarian groups are claimed to be operating in the Kurram Agency.

1: Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan
Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan
Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan , alternatively referred to as the Pakistani Taliban, is an umbrella organization of various Islamist militant groups based in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas along the Afghan border in Pakistan. Most, but not all, Pakistani Taliban groups coalesce under the TTP...



2: Lashkar-e-Islam
Lashkar-e-Islam
Lashkar-e-Islam , literally Army of Islam also transliterated as Lashkar-e-Islami, Lashkar-i-Islam) is a militant organization active in and around Khyber Agency, Federally Administered Tribal Areas, Pakistan. LeI was founded in 2004 by Mufti Munir Shakir...


External links

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