CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2010
| Author | Khan, Taj Kalash |
|---|---|
| Title | KALASH VALLEYS: A CALL FOR INDIGENOUS CULTURAL SURVIVAL RELIGIOUS HEGEMONY IN RECOGNITION OF INDIGENOUS RIGHTS IN THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF PAKISTAN |
| Summary | The Ancient Kafirstan “land of infidels” does not exist any more as it succumbed to brutal Islamization at the end of 19th century. However, it left behind a more than 3000-year-old isolated race with its own language, myths, shamanic institution and agro-pastoral ideology. These last Non-Islamic survivors of Ancient Kafirstan are the “Kalasha” of the Hindu Kush Mountains who now live in three remote valleys in the North West Frontier Province of Pakistan. When the Mountain State of Chitral, of which the Kalasha Valleys were a part, ceded to Pakistan in 1947, the customary justice of non-interference into the tranquil isolation of the Kalasha Valleys was encroached. The cultural enclave of the numerically small non-Islamic Kalasha people has become vulnerable to radical Islamist proselytizers, resource exploiters, ethno-tourism and terrorism. The terrible loss of ancient cultural identity and ethnic territory is a result of ethnocide and neglect by the state of Pakistan. Indigenous peoples elsewhere in the world have successfully evoked Art.27 of ICCPR for restitution and restoration of pre-existing rights of cultural survival. The Kalasha are not currently granted similar protection as the State only recognizes religious minorities but on the 50th session of CERD committee, Pakistan made the dubious confession that the “Kalash were an ethnic and religious minority of only about 3,000 people… believed to be descendants of the Greek soldiers in the army of Alexander the Great, and [Kalash] unique culture was threatened by modernization and tourism.” This official statement sets a case study for cultural survival based on the history and cultural differences of the Kalasha people in respect to the vulnerability of their current situation within Pakistan. The thesis also explores protection for the indigenous Kalasha community, which may be sought through legal means. |
| Supervisor | Prof. Renáta Uitz |
| Department | Legal Studies MA |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2010/khan_taj.pdf |
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