Balakot (; ur, ; ) is a town in Mansehra District in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. The town was destroyed during the

2005 Kashmir earthquake The 2005 Kashmir earthquake occurred at on 8 October in Pakistani-administered Azad Kashmir. It was centred near the city of Muzaffarabad, and also affected nearby Balakot in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and some areas of Indian-administered Jammu and ...

, but was later rebuilt with the assistance of the Government of Pakistan and Saudi Public Assistance for Pakistan Earthquake Victims (SPAPEV), a Saudi relief organisation. Balakot also serves as a hub for tourists visiting Northern Areas

Geography

Balakot is located on the right bank of the

Kunhar River The Kunhar River ( ur, ) or River Kunhar, is a long river, located primarily in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, northern Pakistan. It is in the Indus River watershed basin. Its previous name was NainSukh (Ankhon ka Araam). Some people cla ...

. It is almost at two-thirds of the length of river from it its origin at Lake Dharam Sar deep in the Kaghan Valley, before it confluence with Jehlum River. The lower area below Balakot, sometimes referred to as Nainsukh Valley, is temperate while Kaghan Valley above Balakot City is cold enough to turn the whole area to freezing in the winter. Kaghan valley is a pleasant summer destination. Its upper part from Naran upstream lacks the monsoon but the lower part get it well and so is forested. Balakot is now expanding city and centre among distant northern parts of Pakistan. Smaller hamlets are located in the terraced mountains around it.

Climate

Balakot has a

humid subtropical climate A humid subtropical climate is a zone of climate characterized by hot and humid summers, and cool to mild winters. These climates normally lie on the southeast side of all continents (except Antarctica), generally between latitudes 25° and 40° ...

( Köppen climate classification ''Cfa'') with hot summers and cool winters. Rainfall in Balakot is much higher than in most other parts of Pakistan. The heaviest rainfall occurs either in late winter (February–March) associated with frontal systems, or in the monsoon season (June–August); however, all months see significant rainfall on average.

Administration

Balakot is one of the main cities of Mansehra District. It serves as the chief city of Balakot Tehsil, which is the largest Tehsil of Mansehra District. It has also a Union Council and administers the many surrounding smaller towns and villages.

History

Early history

The known history of the city is not well recorded before the

British Period British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

. Archaeologists from Hazara University, however, have found terracotta remains and terracotta figurines from distant points in the high altitudes around the area. They might shed light on earlier inhabitants of the area. Old graveyards also suggest the linkages toward pre-Muslim occupants who later converted to Islam.

Mughal Empire

Mughals ultimately had this place under their control and there is a local tradition of Mughal Queen, Nur Jahan, while on the way to

Kashmir Kashmir () is the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only the Kashmir Valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal Range. Today, the term encompas ...

, used the route below Balakot near Garhi Habibullah Khan.

Sikhs

Battle of Balakot The Battle of Balakot was fought between the forces of Maharaja Ranjit Singh and Syed Ahmad Barelvi in Balakot, Mansehra District on 6 May 1831. Barelvi declared ''jihad'' against the Sikhs and established a camp in Balakot. Along with Shah Isma ...

is the defining battle in which Syed Ahmad and Shah Ismail were killed.Profile of Dehlvi on books.google.com website
Retrieved 16 August 2018 The historical records give a detailed account of the Tehreek-ul-Mujahideen from Raebareli under the Syed Ahmad Barelvi and

Shah Ismail Ismail I ( fa, اسماعیل, Esmāʿīl, ; July 17, 1487 – May 23, 1524), also known as Shah Ismail (), was the founder of the Safavid dynasty of Iran, ruling as its King of Kings (''Shahanshah'') from 1501 to 1524. His reign is often c ...

. They were accompanied by many followers who believe Syed Ahmad to be a Khalifah, i.e. Caliph, from Raebareli and some local followers of Swati and Syed clans. Balakot was a refuge to them after being ousted from

Swabi Swabi ( ps, صوابۍ; ur, ) is a city in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan,Amb State. The

Sikhs Sikhs ( or ; pa, ਸਿੱਖ, ' ) are people who adhere to Sikhism (Sikhi), a monotheistic religion that originated in the late 15th century in the Punjab region of the Indian subcontinent, based on the revelation of Guru Nanak. The term ...

, under the banner of Lahore Durbar fought the defining battle against this movement and killed every one in general. However, there are local tradition of revering different sites in the hills, by making small stone enclosure where the blood of the wounded Mujahideen was supposedly spilled. They name it as, ' Shaheed'. For the sake of this event, Balakot City is sometime also referred to as, Shuhada ki Sarzameen, i.e. The Land of Martyrs. Sikh Army tried to penetrate from the Garhi Habibullah (15 km downstream) with armies from Kashmir but were put to hold till the reinforcement arrived from Lahore via Timri near Shinkiari. On a little mound in the north of the city, by the Rou Nala, the Battle of Balakot was fought on 6 May 1831. Sikhs became victorious and all the Mujahideens including Syed Ahmad and Shah Ismail were killed. Mahtab Singh, a writer of the history of Hazara to the wish of James Abbot, writes that Sikhs, to stop the movement to continue any further, reopened the grave of Syed Ahmad and set the body into the Kunhar Rive r. It may possibly be right as in Talhatta 10 km down stream another grave is also dedicated to him. Local tradition also support that it is the head buried here. It was a brutal and fearsome rule which ended after James Abbot's coming in

Hazara Hazara may refer to: Ethnic groups * The Hazaras, a Persian-speaking people of Afghanistan and Pakistan * Aimaq Hazara, Aimaq's subtribe of Hazara origin * Hazarawals, a Hindko-speaking people of the Hazara region of northern Pakistan * Hazar ...

and things changed after he incited local chiefdom against Sikhs in his own bid. There have been many skirmishes between locals and Shiks forces. One famous event happened in 1844 when Gulab Singh, Maharaja of Kashmir sent a campaign to

Chilas Chilas ( ur, ) is a city and is the divisional capital of Diamer District located in Gilgit-Baltistan, Pakistan, on the Indus River. It is part of the Silk Road connected by the Karakoram Highway and N-90 National Highway, which link it to Islam ...

under Diwan Ibrahim, which was effectively destroyed by local populations in Kaghan Valley at Diwan Bela, named after him.

British Rule

After James Abbot coming to the region in early 1840s, Sikhs were kept in check in upper

. And he was able to wage war on Sikhs with this local support in Haripur. It was brutal rule of Sikhs which made him lead local chiefs and their forces. He sat in Balakot and distributed the land to the people in a summary settlement. During the War of Independence 1857, no local chief is reported to have revolted. It is rather the other side of the history that local chiefs helped British Army to bring down mutineers of Hoti Garrission, Mardan. 55th Native Infantry mutineers were trying to seek refuge in Kashmir State, however they were only able to cross Indus in Kohistan and went up the hilly route and caught near Lake Dudipatsar by local forces of the Kaghan chiefs,

Kohistanis Indus Kohistanis are an Indo-Aryan ethnolinguistic group speaking the Maiya language. They are located in Indus Kohistan, in northern Pakistan. History Inhabiting the region of Indus Kohistan, the Kohistani formerly practiced Hinduism and ...

and Gujjars. The whole gorge is now known as Purbi Nar means the gorge of Eastern People i.e. people from Bengal. Few escaped and captured by Kashmir State and then handed over to British Army for execution. Rest of the British Period gone well and many remains of British Period structures can be seen. Examples are Dakbungalows at Burawai (now ruined PWD Rest House), Lalazar, Battakundi, Naran (now WAPDA Rest House), Kamal Ban, Sharan, Shogran, Balakot can be seen. There are number of bridges also found.

Independence 1947

Oral tradition says that there were many Hindu and Sikh inhabitants, most of whom were Khatris who decided to leave for India after partition. No reports of any riots emerged from the time. However, the parties were launched to put the Kashmir State Army on hold along current

Line of Control The Line of Control (LoC) is a military control line between the Indian and Pakistanicontrolled parts of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir—a line which does not constitute a legally recognized international boundary, but serve ...

from all the villages around Balakot.

2005 earthquake

The town was completely destroyed in a destructive earthquake on 8 October 2005. The fault almost passes through the main bazaar of Balakot. It follows the hilly area to the north up to Allai and leads to the Bagh in

Azad Jammu & Kashmir Azad Jammu and Kashmir (; ), abbreviated as AJK and colloquially referred to as simply Azad Kashmir, is a region administered by Pakistan as a nominally self-governing entitySee: * * * and constituting the western portion of the larger Ka ...

from the villages of Balakot like

Kanshian Kanshian (Hindko: ) is a village located in Mansehra District, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. It is a village of Union councils of Pakistan, Union Council Garlat of tehsil Balakot to the south east of the Balakot ci ...

and

Jabri Kaleesh Jabri is one of the 44 union councils, administrative subdivisions, of Haripur District in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. Union Council Jabri 8 Villages Jabri, Bandi,Lanjiyaan syedaan, dhakan paisar, Kohala Nallah. Tayal, Darkot, ...

. This fault line – the Balakot-Bagh fault – is said to be the source of the Kashmir earthquake. The estimated death toll from the Balakot town and the districts in the affected Kashmir area was put at 73,000 with some sources claiming the number is over 80,000. The hillside town of Balakot, comprising 12 union councils with a population of 30,000 people, was completely destroyed by the earthquake on 8 October 2005. Over 90 per cent of the houses were reduced to muddy smears. The survivors will be relocated to the New Balakot City, currently being developed near Mansehra. The United Arab Emirates volunteered to rebuild this town into an improved one with housing colonies, schools, hospitals, and other civic facilities. However the Pakistan government has announced that the city will be relocated about 20 km away at a safer spot with more earthquake-proof buildings (see section below). Jaish-e-Mohammed militant group also had presence near the town. A 2004 United States Department of Defense document also stated that there was a JeM training camp in Balakot. However, according to analysts, the militants left Balakot after the earthquake in 2005 to avoid detection by the international aid groups arriving to provide relief.Maria Abi-Habib
After India's Strike on Pakistan, Both Sides Leave Room for De-escalation
'' The New York Times''

New Balakot City

After the earthquake, it was discovered that the city was built on geological fault lines and the government recommended moving the residents 15 miles away to Bakarial. Many residents, however, were reluctant to leave and vowed to rebuild the town. The new site was decided to be renamed to "New Balakot City" and the original town of Balakot to be preserved as "national heritage". In 2011, it was reported that many residents of Balakot had been rebuilding their homes and businesses in the town, despite a government ban. A decade after the earthquake, the New Balakot City was still being constructed and many residents still lived in temporary earthquake-resistant shelters. Amid the locals' discontent, the Pakistani government cited the problem of acquiring the land at Bakrayal as a reason for the delay due to a dispute between the national and provincial government as well as the landowners. There are observers who also note that political patronage diverted aid away from those who need it. There are those who started rebuilding their houses in the old city. By 2006, construction of New Balakot City resumed.

2019 bombing by the Indian Air Force

In the early morning hours of 26 February, Indian warplanes crossed the de facto border in the disputed region of

, and dropped bombs in the vicinity of Balakot. Pakistan's military, the first to announce the airstrike on 26 February morning, described the Indian planes as dropping their payload in an uninhabited wooded hilltop area near Balakot. Quote: "A spokesman for Pakistan’s armed forces, Maj. Gen. Asif Ghafoor, on Tuesday posted on Twitter four images of a forested area pockmarked with small craters and debris, which he said was the site of Indian airstrikes." India, confirming the airstrike later the same day, characterised it to be a preemptive strike directed against a terrorist training camp, and causing the deaths of more than 100 terrorists. Analysis of open-source satellite imagery by the

Atlantic Council The Atlantic Council is an American think tank in the field of international affairs, favoring Atlanticism, founded in 1961. It manages sixteen regional centers and functional programs related to international security and global economic prosp ...

's Digital Forensics Laboratory, Quote: "Indian fighter jets carried out strikes against targets inside undisputed Pakistani territory, but open-source evidence suggested that the strike was unsuccessful." San Francisco-based

Planet Labs Planet Labs PBC (formerly Planet Labs, Inc. and Cosmogia, Inc.) is an American public Earth imaging company based in San Francisco, California. Their goal is to image the entirety of the Earth daily to monitor changes and pinpoint trends. The co ...

, Quote: "The images produced by Planet Labs Inc, a San Francisco-based private satellite operator, show at least six buildings on the madrasa site on 4 March, six days after the airstrike. ... There are no discernible holes in the roofs of buildings, no signs of scorching, blown-out walls, displaced trees around the madrasa or other signs of an aerial attack." European Space Imaging, and the

Australian Strategic Policy Institute The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) is a defence and strategic policy think tank based in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, founded by the Australian government and funded by the Australian and overseas governments, industry ...

, Quote: "But India’s recent air strike on a purported Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorist camp in Balakot in Pakistan on 26 February suggests that precision strike is still an art and science that requires both practice and enabling systems to achieve the intended effect. Simply buying precision munitions off the shelf is not enough." has concluded that India did not hit any targets of significance on the Jaba hilltop site in the vicinity of Balakot. Quote: " Open-source satellite imagery suggests India did not hit any targets of consequence in the airstrikes it conducted after the terrorist attack on the paramilitaries. Quote: "Analysis of open-source satellite imagery has also cast doubt on India’s claims. A report by the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab was able to geolocate the site of the attack and provide a preliminary damage assessment. It compared satellite images from the days before and after India’s strike and concluded there were only impacts in the wooded areas with no damage visible to surrounding structures." On 10 April, some international journalists, who were taken to the Jaba hilltop in a tightly controlled trip after 45 days of the strike arranged by Pakistani government, found the largest building of the site to show no evidence of damage. Quote: "Those visiting the site on Wednesday didn't see any signs that there had been significant building work to either clear structures or erect new ones. And the vegetation didn't appear to have suffered the stress that might be expected from a missile attack." Quote: "They were given access to an Islamic school in Balakot, where Indian media say militants were killed in retaliation for an attack in Kashmir. The large building appeared to be fully intact ..." Quote: "International outlets which visited the Indian air strike site in Pakistan found no evidence of a major terrorist training camp – or of any infrastructure damage at all." Quote: "One thing is clear: India's claim that it destroyed a militant training camp and killed more than 300 extremists cannot be backed up by the evidence. More than a month after India launched airstrikes inside Pakistan in retaliation for a militant attack that killed 40 paramilitary troops in Kashmir, foreign media have been allowed to see the areas hit."

Ethnicity

The majority of the population are speakers of

Hindko Hindko (, romanized: , ) is a cover term for a diverse group of Lahnda dialects spoken by several million people of various ethnic backgrounds in several areas in northwestern Pakistan, primarily in the provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Pun ...

, an Indo-Aryan language closely related to Punjabi, and also spoken in the rest of Mansehra District. There are also speakers of

Gujari Gojri (, ), also known as Gujari, Gujri, Gojari, or Gojri, is a variety of Rajasthani spoken by the Gurjars and other tribes of India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. In India, the language is mainly spoken in Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Prad ...

. The main city area of Balakot is inhibited by Gujjar, Awan, Swati, Madakhail/Madakhel Clan Yousafzai, Syed,

Turk Turk or Turks may refer to: Communities and ethnic groups * Turkic peoples, a collection of ethnic groups who speak Turkic languages * Turkish people, or the Turks, a Turkic ethnic group and nation * Turkish citizen, a citizen of the Republic o ...

Mughal Mughal or Moghul may refer to: Related to the Mughal Empire * Mughal Empire of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries * Mughal dynasty * Mughal emperors * Mughal people, a social group of Central and South Asia * Mughal architecture * Mug ...

and Hanki.

Transportation

In 1965, a bridge was built in Balakot over the

Kunhar river The Kunhar River ( ur, ) or River Kunhar, is a long river, located primarily in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, northern Pakistan. It is in the Indus River watershed basin. Its previous name was NainSukh (Ankhon ka Araam). Some people cla ...

called the Ayub Bridge. The bridge connects Balakot, as well as the Kaghan valley, with the rest of Pakistan.Balakot bridge's repair restores KP-GB traffic
" Dawn.

References

External links

aerial view

* ttp://tribune.com.pk/story/269962/2005-earthquake-balakot-remembers-its-dead-amid-tears-and-sobs/ story re 2005 earthquake in Balakot {{Mansehra-Union-Councils 2005 Kashmir earthquake Union councils of Mansehra District Populated places in Mansehra District Cities destroyed by earthquakes