badr afridi

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some rarely known facts about afridi's

*AFRIDI:-*(Urdu: ﺁﻓﺮﯾﺪﯼ ) (pashto: ﺍﭘﺮﻳﺪﻱ ) is a Pashtun tribe. The Afridi tribe is the most powerful and dominant tribe of the Khyber Agency. The Afridis inhabit about 1000 square miles of rough hilly area in the eastern Safed Koh range, west of the Peshawar Valley. Maidan in Tirah which can be accessed by the Kajurhi plains and the valleys of Bara and Churah. The tribe numbers about 315,000 people.*CLANS:-*
There are eight clans in the Afridi Tribe:
*1. Adam Khel* 
*2. Aka Khel
3. Kamar Khel
4. Kambar Khel
5. Kuki Khel
6. Malikdin Khel
7. Zakka Khel
8. Sipah*

*HISTORY:-*The famous historian Herodotus mentions a country bordering on the banks of the Indus occupied by a people called the Pactyae who were divided into four nations, one which was the Aparthea, or Aparutai, identified with the modern Afridis. They lay claim to an inaccessible upland area of refuge, the Tirah and its central place, Maidan and at Bagh. As a result, they have literally have been able to force every passing conqueror to pay toll tax for use or passage through the Khyber Pass. Some writers think that some tribes like the Afridis and Khattaks are indigenous, considering, for instance, that the Afridis inhabited this terrain even during pre-historic times, which is before the recorded movement of other notable Pashtun tribes to their present abodes. Olaf Caroe and Aurel Stein are reported to have suggested that the Afridis may be the original inhabitants of the Gandhara area rather than an integral part of the great clans allegedly descended from the tribes of Israel*CRIME:-*Pakistani Afridis during the British rule fought bravely against the British dictatorship. In return Afridis were not given any government jobs and no developments were undertaken in those areas where Afridis lived. That resulted in the backwardness of Afridis. From that day on, they were compelled to use illegal means of trade. During cold war, they were the most suited for smuggling in Afghanistan, supplying arms and ammunition to USA allied Jihadies. They have also traded their arms and ammunition to Kashmiries Jihadies and Sikhs of India who wanted independence from India. The Afridis gained notoriety for indulging in smuggling of foreign goods, and narcotics etc. They are also well-known as robbers of merchant caravans in the past, and in the present day context, Spain notes them to be "consummate smugglers", with an avid interest in trade, and some are involved in smuggling, the narcotics trade and kidnapping for ransom.*RELIGION:*-Most Afridis follow the religion of Islam. The Afridis are said to have been initially converted to Islam during the time of Mahmud of Ghazni, and then during the time of Muhammad of Ghor. The Afridis are found to throng the Masjids at the time of prayers. A pleasant surprise comes, at the time of Eid Milad-ul-Nabi (the Holy Prophet's birthday), when the festival is held with unusual fervor and religious zeal, which is a spectacular sight. They are also observed to subscribe to many religious rituals.*FAMOUS AFRIDI'S**Ajab Khan Afridi*, a brave Pashtun who fought with the British soldiers, kidnapped the daughter of the then British Army Chief in the region and handed them her back himself. She was kept in respect and hospitality and when she went back to her family and army, she used to tell stories of the respect and hospitality that was given to her by the family of Ajab Khan Afridi.
*Khatir Afridi*, a prominent poet who wrote over 40,000 poems in his only four years of writing poetry. He died very young at the age of 32. Only one of his sons is still alive, and this man has collected all his poems and made a book out of them, a book which has achieved a good market value among speakers of Pashto.
*Shahid Afridi*, Pakistani cricketer. Holds world record for fastest century (off only 37 balls).

history of afridi

"AFRIDI" or "APRIDI" (singular -ay), designation of a major Pashtun tribe in northwest Pakistan, with a few members in Afghanistan. The Afridi form part of the "Ghilzi" and are thus of the so-called "eastern Pashtun," who are to be distinguished from the "Dorrani" (or Abdali) encompassing the "western Pashtun." Their language is Pashto Mashreqi. Their eponymous ancestor is supposed to have been a certain Faridun, a descendant of Karlan (whence the Karlani lineage) through Mani (or Manay?) and Koday (and his second wife).
Scholars have sometimes seen in the Aparutai, who, according to Herodotus, inhabited the seventh satrapy along with the Sattagudai, Gandarioi, and Dadikai, the origin and etymology of the Apridi (as they call themselves). It is, however, almost impossible to accept this double hypothesis. The Achaemenid inscriptions do not mention the name of the Aparutai, and we know nothing of where they lived. Moreover the etymology, although attractive, is highly improbable. The linguistic context of the region (Dardic languages in the ancient period and Pashto much later) would rather suggest an evolution of the type aparutai *pril- (by apheresis of a-, syncope of -a-, and -t- > -1-). The belief in a Greek origin still current among the Afridi can not be taken into consideration, for it results from a folkloric tradition to be found in a good part of the Dardo-Kafir domain. It was propagated, for example, by Abu'l-Fazl Allami, the private secretary of the emperor Akbar; especially in the 19th and 20th centuries, it has been revitalized by orientalists in the grip of Hellenism, as well as by politicians seeking to claim Aryan blood.
Among the Afridi six so called "Khyber clans" are generally distinguished: the Kuki Khel, Kambar Khel, Kamar Khel (or Kamra'i or Kamar Din Khl), Malek-din Khel, Sepah, and Zakka Khel (or Zaka Khel), all established in the region of the Khyber pass. In addition, there are two "assimilated" clans not recognized by the first six; the Aka Khel, settled south of the Bara river in contact with the Orakzai, and the Adam Khel, occupying a mountainous region between Peshawar and Kohat. Bellew ("Inquiry. pp. 91-94") gives a much more complex clan structure, in which the eight clans cited above are included. The essential point is the complexity of the Afridi, which perhaps reflects the diversity of the origins of the different ethnic groups forming this great tribe.
According to J. W. Murray ("Dictionary, p. 54"), at the end of the 19th century the majority of the Afridi, with the exception of the Adam Khel, were still nomads. In summer they migrated to the Tirah heights, from which, at the beginning of the 19th century, they had driven the Dardic Tirahi, who have become more or less Pashtunized and live today in the valley of Kot south of Jalalabad in Afghanistan. The Afridi winter quarters were in the Khyber, Bazar, and Kajuri valleys. The location of their settlements seems hardly to have varied over a long period, a fact which favours the hypothesis that at least in large part, they are of Dardic origin. A tradition reported by Bellew ("Inquiry, p. 91") claims that it was the Ghaznavid Sultan Mahmud who had installed them as a military colony in the Khyber region and that two centuries later Shehab-al-din Ghauri reinforced them by means of a new shift of population of the same origin. These probably historical facts in no way weaken the preceding hypothesis, but confirm what we know about many other Pashtun ethnic groups, that is, their heterogeneity, of which Bellew ("ibid."), despite flagrant errors, sensed the importance.
In the estimate of J. W. Murray ("loc. cit."), toward the end of the 19th century the Afridi numbered 32,900 men of fighting age ("fighting men") in the easternmost part of the "Safid Kuh", to the west and south of Peshawar, in the Bazar and Bara valleys, and in the northern part of Tirah. C. C. Davies (""Afridi," EI2, p. 237") estimates them today at 50,000, a figure which seems reasonable. But a delicate problem is raised by the large number (as high as 60,000) of Afridi who are supposed, according to unofficial Afghan sources, to reside on Afghan territory. They are classed as sedentary husbandmen or farmers and often also as producers of charcoal. Certainly we have often met Afridi in the Mashreqi and elsewhere in Afghanistan - tradesmen, truck drivers, agricultural workers, either seasonal or permanently established as hamsaya ("clients" in the Roman sense) of great landed proprietors, and sometimes even themselves proprietors or owners of flocks. But their numbers seem to us quite modest. We believe therefore that the excessive figure sometimes mentioned in Afghanistan reflects in a particular way the Afghan claim to Pashtunistan and actually represents an estimate of the whole of the Afridi tribe on both sides of the frontier.
The Afridi first appear in history with Babor, who had decided to bring them under his control ("Babor-nama, tr. A. S. Beveridge, London, 1922 [repr. 1969], p. 412"). Their strategic position is extraordinary. The region of Peshawar is ringed by mountains, which are pierced by four passes. To the east a road over the plains leads via Nowshera (Naw-Sar) to the Punjab. To the north the Malakand (Malakanrh) pass gives access to Kohestan (Dir, Chitral, Gilgit, and so on, on one hand, and Swat, on the other). But the two other exits, the Khyber pass to the west, which gives access to the Kabul road, and that of Kohat to the south, which controls the road from Bannu, Waziristan, and Baluchistan, are in the hands of the Afridi. Thus they have always enjoyed the profits of brigandage or tolls levied on all those who have sought the right to pass. Their quarrels with the Mughal emperors are famous. But the punitive expeditions of Akbar, Jahangir, and Awrangzeb could not subdue them, and Ahmad Shah Dorrani was able to integrate them into his army only nominally. The British occupying forces had no more success. They constantly clashed with the Afridi, who sometimes exacted a high price. In fact, the latter continually pressed their demands and in particular were able to profit from each of the Anglo-Afghan wars (1839-42, 1878-80, 1919-20) and the two world wars (1914-18, 1939-45) to affirm their independence. But their strategic position is such that the British authorities did not stint in providing subsidies. A subvention granted in exchange for their loyalty during World War I was augmented on several occasions, to the detriment of ethnic groups who received less or nothing at all. Today their territory in Pakistan still constitutes a sort of free zone famous for traffic in arms, munitions, tobacco, and other goods. This concession continues the old tradition of the "mawajeb "subsidy given to unpacified tribes to curb their turbulence. The role of the Afridi in the movement to further the economic, political, and cultural demands of the Pashtun continues to be dominant.Bibliography
Information on the Afridis is supplied by a large number of works. See especially the following, along with the works listed in the bibliographies of such studies as:
  * DAVIES (EI2, pp. 238-39) and CAROE, M. W. BELLEW, "An Inquiry into the Ethnography of Afghanistan", Woking, 1891 (repr. Graz, 1973), pp. 89-94.
  * O. CAROE, "The Pathans, 550 B.C.-A.D". 1957, London, 1958, passim.
  * V. GREGORIAN, "The Emergence of Modern Afghanistan: Politics of Reform and Modernization, 1880-1946", Stanford, 1969, passim.
  * J. W. MURRAY, "A Dictionary of the Pathan Tribes on the North-West Frontier of India", Calcutta, 1899 (repr. 1910) p. 54.
  * NIAMATULLAH, "History of the Afghans", tr. B. DORN, 1829-36 (2nd ed., London and Santiago de Compostela, 1965), p. 130, n. 90.
  * J. A. NORRIS, "The First Afghan War, 1838-1842", Cambridge, 1967, passim.
  * E. E. OLIVER, "Across the Border or Pathan and Biloch", London, 1890, pp. 183-94.
  * G. B. SCOTT, "Afghan and Pathan: A Sketch", London, 1929, pp. 109-32.
  * "(The) Second Afghan War, 1878-80: Official Account", Produced in the Intelligence Branch, Army Head-Quarters, India, London, 1908, index s.v. "Afridis," "Khyber Field Force," "Khyber Line Force," "Khyber Pass," "Khyber Tribes."
  * L. THOMAS, "Beyond Khyber Pass", London, n.d. (ca. 1925), passim.
  * R. WARBURTON, "Eighteen Years in the Khyber, 1879-1898", London, 1900, passim.

pashtuns ..

The Pathans are a Caucasoid race, who emigrated from the Middle East during the first millennium B.C., popular tradition identifying them as the lost tribe of Israel who disappeared into the desert. As the story goes the race was founded in the seventh century by Kais, thirty seventh lineal descendant of Saul of Israel who lived near Ghur in Afghanistan . After being converted by a missionary to Islam Kais moved to Kandahar where the new clan took its language Pashtu and the growing tribe spread north and east into the mountains. The three great branches of the clan which live in north Pakistan and Afghanistan trace their origin to a son of Kais. The Sarbani Pathans, which include the Yousefzai, Shinwari, Mohmands , Muhammedzai , Durrani, Ghori Khel and Khaikai khel, claim descend from Sarban. The Ghilzai Pathans, among which are the Suliman Khel and Aka Khel are descendants of Baitan. The Ghurghust Pathans, such as the Afridis, Khattaks, Wazir, Mashuds, Turis, Jajis ,Daurs, and Bangash are the descendants of Ghurghust.
Physically, the Pathan are taller and stronger than the Negroid races to the south, and slimmer and more hirsute than the Mongoloids to the north . The Pathans are a tough, proud and fiercely independent people who call no man master. The Pathans occupy a vast territory, follow a wide variety of callings, and are subdivided into numerous small and semi-independent groups, like the old Scottish clans.

The Pathan is an individualist whose relations with others are governed by a code of custom and honour know as “ Pakhtunwali “ the way ,of life for a Pathan . Paktunwali promulgates three basic laws: the law of vengeance, which insists on retribution for every wrong no matter how slight done to family, clan or tribe; the law of hospitality, which must be extended to any who seek it, invited or uninvited , Pathan or foreigner, Muslim or unbeliever; and the law of sanctuary ‘Nanwatai ‘which must be given to all who ask for it, even an enemy. The Pathans adherence to this code in the long-term binds them together, in the short-term it can have just the opposite effect. In war the Pathan generally obeyed approved leaders of his own tribe, in peace it was his pride to obey no one.

Who are Pathans ??

who are pathans ??

The Pathans live in Northern Pakistan and Afghanistan. The group is made up of some 60 Pushto-speaking tribes. The Pathans, also known as Pakhtuns, Pashtuns, Pushtuns, and Pakhtoons, number some 10 million in Pakistan and some 8 million in Afghanistan. They make up the largest ethnocultural group in Afghanistan.
The Pathans comprise distinct groups. Some live as nomads in the high mountains with herds of goats and camels; others, such as those living in the Swat Valley, are farmers; and still others are traders or seasonal laborers. However, this ethnographic description defies the fact that they constitute more than 20% of Pakistan's armed forces and dominate Pakistan's transportation industry and have provided the most popular Pakistani president Ayub Khan who lead the major industrialization movement which Pakistan has seen in the last 54 years.
The British attacked the Pathans in the late 19th and early 20th century. They were finally forced to offer the Pathans a semiautonomous area between the border of British India and Afghanistan. After the creation of Pakistan in 1947, the new nation annexed the Pathan border regions.
In the early 1950s, the Soviet Union through Afghanistan supported Pathan ambitions for the creation of an independent Pushtunistan (also called Pakhtunistan) in the border areas of West Pakistan. Several border clashes and ruptures of diplomatic relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan ensued. The movement was never able to gain popular support considering that Pathans in Pakistan were always better off than Pathans in Afghanistan.
Pathans also helped liberate the part of Kashmir which is now under Pakistan's control. Their support and hospitality to more than four million Afghan refugees was crucial in Afghan's liberation from the Soviet Union.
The Pathans are known as people who are brave, simple, and sincere in their dealings with others. They are noted as fierce fighters, and throughout history they have offered strong resistance to invaders. They staunchly hold on to their cultural traditions and connect with one another in a visceral way.
Most are guided by a tribal code of ethics, Pakhtunwali, or "way of the Pakhtun (Pathan)." Tribal customs and traditions make up the biggest part of the Pathan society. The tenets of Pakhtunwali show the true essence of Pathan culture and these rules are followed religiously. It incorporates the following major practices: "melmastia" (hospitality and protection to every guest); "nanawati" (the right of a fugitive to seek a place of refuge, and acceptance of his bona fide offer of peace); "badal" (the right of blood feuds or revenge); "tureh" (bravery); "sabar" (steadfastness); "imandari" (righteousness); "'isteqamat" (persistence); "ghayrat" (defense of property and honor); and "mamus" (defense of one's women).

badr afridi

badar afridi