Prehistoric Venus – Beyond Ancient Art

Prehistoric Venus, or Ancient Goddess, is a reference to a class of art object made by modern humans before writing existed, therefore ‘pre-history’ by definition. Writing started in several places at approximately the same time, around 3500-3000BC. Sumer and China were close together with Sumer currently viewed as being the first. All other places were later than that with Mesoamerica being less than 1000 BC. Therefore, the term prehistoric has a different meaning depending on location.
To put things into perspective current research has the dispersal of Homo Sapien into Europe set for 45,000 to 30,000 years ago. That dispersion occurred before the last glacial period that started circa 30,000 years ago and ended circa 10,000 years ago. Glacial maximums have been associated with the extinction of species and after the last maximum (commonly called ‘the last ice age’) the only human-like life form left was Homo Sapien. Populations would rise in refuge areas (Refugiums) during the glacial periods and dispersion would occur in the interglacial periods. Art followed Homo Sapien, whether that is the earliest known cave wall painting dated to circa 30,000BC or the Ancient Goddess known as Prehistoric Venus. The oldest Prehistoric Venus found to date is the Venus of Hohle Fels, found recently in Germany, which has been dated to 40,000 to 35,000BC. That pre-dates the last glacial expansion and any known cave paintings. That is old! Its age does coincide with Homo Sapien expansion in Europe in an interglacial period.
Several other Prehistoric Venuses have been found and dated to times when the last glacial period was at its maximum; a time when Britain was largely under ice and the Iberian Peninsula was a refuge. Clearly some hardy folks remained in the frozen tundra that was Europe, at least those parts not beneath the crushing weight of glaciers.  The following are very old artifacts:
•    35,000 – 40,000BC Venus of Hohle Fels, Germany. Discovered in 2009 predates the last ice age.
•    30,000 BC - Venus of Willendorf discovered in Austria, 1908.
•    25,000 BC – Venus of Lespuge discovered in a French cave in 1922.
•    23,000 BC – Venus of Brassempouy discovered in 1894 in Brassempouy, Landes, France.
•    20,000 BC – Venus of Laussel discovered in 1911 in a cave in Dordogne, France.

All were created before or during the last glacial period.

Following are some post-glacial Venuses:

•    4000 BC – Nile River Goddess discovered in Mohamerian, near Edfu, Egypt.
•    3200-2800 BC – Turriga Mother Goddess discovered in Sardinia, Italy
•    3000 BC – Dreamer of Malta discovered on the Mediterranean island of Malta.
•    2600 BC – Harvest Goddess from Mohenjo Daro discovered in 1920 in Pakistan’s Sindh province.
Prehistoric Venuses have common elements of distorted features and aggressive sexuality. Most prehistoric art found to date depicts women, which causes much speculation about the concept of ‘Mother Earth’ worship. The most intriguing aspect of Prehistoric Venus, apart from age, is commonality in form yet they come from diverse cultures and locations. We may never know the reason or how dispersed communities came to have common themes in art. Yet one truth remains; at this time the Prehistoric Venus of Hohle Fels is the oldest known art in the world.

Mansura - ancient capital of Sindh

Mansura served as the capital of the Arab Emirate of Sindh during the 300 year rule of the Arabs in this region of South Asia. It emerged as one of the leading cities of the Umayyad and Abbasid Empires. It had a prominent University, which produced numerous religious texts in Arabic. The scholars produced by the Mansura University established close rapport with scholars in Baghdad and other important centres of learning in the Umayyad and Abbasid Empires.
Archaeological Site
 The ruins of Mansura are spread over an area of more than 400 hectares near the city of Shahdadpur in Central Sindh.  They comprise of hillocks or mounds, some of which rise to a height of about eleven meters above the level of the surrounding plains. These mounds are encircled by about 9-kilometer long baked-brick fortification walls, with semi-circular bastions at regular intervals and four massive gates.
Sound Architectural concepts
Mansura was essentially an Arab city in which all the sectors of were laid out according to a well-conceived plan based on late Umayyad and early Abbasid experience of construction of similar cities in Iraq. It incorporated liberal concepts in the utilization of space and material resources. The 60-meter wide major arteries of traffic had spacious squares at their points of intersection; narrow lanes in residential areas were paved with baked bricks fixed on edges. The forests were cleared to make way for the construction of the new city, but date palms and fruit trees were still plentiful, lining the streets and filling up open spaces.
The Grand Congregational Mosque occupied the central square. Other buildings were constructed within similar blocks created by a network of wide roads.  Within the blocks there was a generous provision of lanes, which ensured neat packaging of houses and permitted efficient disposal of liquid effluents and solid waste material.
The general layout provided for segregation of public administration, residential, industrial and commercial activities. Industries were allocated sectors along the northern and southern boundaries of the site. Public and Administrative buildings were located all around the Grand Mosque.
Physical infrastructure
The infrastructure facilities at Mansura provide an example of the high level of sophistication achieved by the Umayyad and Abbasid architects and engineers in the art of town planning. They adapted and further refined the technologies used by the Byzantine and Sassanian town planners in Syria and Persia prior to the establishment of Umayyad Empire. Cleanliness and hygiene got high consideration in their town plans.
Elaborate provisions were made for disposal of waste water and sewerage. Open drains were generally provided in the houses of the commoners, while within the palatial buildings the drains were invariably covered. Waste water from the buildings fed an integrated network of brick-covered drains along the streets.
Refined technologies were applied for efficient disposal of sewerage. Soak pits were provided with earthenware jars and terracotta rings in an arrangement in which solid matter was first made to disintegrate by the action of anaerobic bacteria and then the effluents slowly seeped through openings between terracotta rings.
Adequate provision was also made in each sector for wells to supply sufficient clean water to each household for drinking and cooking purposes and for bathing and washing. Outside the walled city, plenty of water was available from the Indus River to maintain orchards and irrigate the fields.

Rani Kot The World's Biggest Fort

Ranikot Fort is the world's largest fort with a circumference of about 29 km or 18 miles. Since 1993, it has been on the list of tenative UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
LOCATION:
It is located in the Kirthar Range, about 30 km southwest of Sann, in Jamshoro District, Sindh, Pakistan. It is approximately 90 km north of Hyderabad.
HISTORY:

Who constructed it first and why? Is an enigma yet to be resolved by researchers. Some archaeologists attribute it to Arabs,possibly built by a Persian noble under the Abbasids by Imran Bin Musa Barmaki who was the Governor of Sindh in 836 CE. Others have suggested a much earlier period of construction attributing to at times the Sassanians Persians and at times to the Greeks. Despite the fact that a prehistoric site of Amri is nearby, there is no trace of any old city inside the fort and the present structure has little evidence of prehistoric origins.
Archaeologists point to 17th century CE as its time of first construction but now Sindh archaeologists agree that some of the present structure was reconstructed by Mir Karam Ali Khan Talpur and his brother Mir Murad Ali in 1812 CE at a cost of 1.2 million rupees (Sind Gazetteer, 677).
Fort Ranikot is located in Lakki Mountains of the Kirthar range on the right side of the mighty River Indus at a distance of about 30 kilometers from the present day town of Sann. A mountainous ridge, Karo Takkar(Black Hill), running north to south, forms its western boundary and the ‘Lundi Hills' forms its eastern boundary. Mohan Nai, a rain-stream enters the fort from its rarely used western ‘Mohan Gate', where it is guarded by a small fortification, changes its name to ‘Reni' or ‘Rani Nai' or rain-stream and gives the fort its name. Ranikot is thus the ‘fort of a rain stream' – Rani. It runs through it, tumbles in a series of turquoise pools to irrigate fields and leaves the fort from its most used ‘Sann Gate' on the eastern side. It then travels about 33 kilometers more to enter the Lion River – Indus.
Most of the twenty kilometers long wall is made of natural cliffs and barricades of mountainous rocks which at places rise as high as two thousand feet above sea level! Only about 8.25 km portions of its wall are man-made, built with yellow sandstone. This was first measured on foot by Badar Abro along with local guide Sadiq Gabol. As one enters the fort, one can find hills, valleys, streams, ditches, ponds, pools, fossils, building structure, bastions, watchtowers, ammunition depots, fortresses – all inside Ranikot, adding more to its beauty and mystery. A spring emerging from an underground water source near the Mohan Gate is named as ‘Parryen jo Tarr' (the spring of fairies).
According to a tale told by the local inhabitants, fairies come from far and wide on the Ponam Nights (full moon) to take bath at this spring near ‘Karo Jabal'! Splashing sounds of water falling on the rocks can be heard at another spring, Waggun jo Tarr or "the Crocodile Spring", named so as crocodiles once lived there.
Within Ranikot, there are two more fortresses – Meeri and Shergarh, both have 5 bastions each. Meerikot takes its name from the word ‘Mir' meaning top (for instance the top of a hill, chief of any Baloch tribe, etc.). Both the main Ranikot and the inner Meerikot have similar entrances – curved, angulated with a safe tortuous path. "The bridge in front of Ranikot resembles to a smaller bridge in front of a fortress in Verona, Italy" writes Ishtiaq Ansari, the writer of ‘Sindh ja koat aaein qillaa' (Forts and Fortresses of Sindh) and a member of Sindh Exploration and Adventure Society. From the military point of view, Meerikot is located at a very safe and central place in the very heart of the Ranikot with residential arrangements including a water-well.
Talpur Mirs used Meerikot as their fortified residence. One can explore ruins of the court, harem, guest rooms, and soldiers quarters inside it. Its 1435 feet long wall has five bastions. Every structure in the Ranikot has its own uniqueness and beauty. Looking up from Meerikot one can find another fortified citadel – Shergarh (Abode of Lions) built with whitish stone, it too has five bastions. Though its location at 1480 feet above the sea level makes this fortress a unique structure, it also makes it equally difficult for supply of water, which can only be had from the brooks and rain streams, hundreds of feet below.The steep climb up to Shergarh gives a commanding view down over the whole fort and its entrance and exit points. On a clear day one can even see Indus, 37 kilometers away to the east.
Beside the Mohan Gate and the Sann Gate, there are two more gates, rather pseudo gates. One is towards the side of ancient town of Amri. This ‘gate' is called the ‘Amri Gate'. Certainly it takes its name from the prehistoric ruins of Amri, but it must have taken this name much later than the times of Amri as the fort itself doesn't appears to be as old as the Amri itself. In fact there is a bridge over rain stream ‘Toming Dhoro' exiting from the fort called ‘Budhi Mori'. The breach in fort wall due to the river stream has been referred as a gate. Similarly, the Shahpir Gate to the south also appears to be a pseudo gate taking its name from a limestone rock with a rough shape of foot imprinted on it. The sacred footprint supposedly belongs to Hazrat Ali or some other religious personality and is venerated by locals. It seems to be a later breach in the fort wall instead of a formal gate because one can't find any bastion or watchtower or their remains at the site, needed to guard any formal entrance or exit points.
A mosque found in the fort appears to be a later modification of a watchtower or a later construction. Scattered animal skeletons and prehistoric fossils can be found on the top of Lundi Hills. One of the three graveyards has about four hundred graves made of Chowkundi like sandstone with engraved motifs of sunflowers and peacocks. Whether we can call them as theriomorphic and phytomorphic motifs is an open question. Another one appears to be a graveyard of Arabs. The third one, about a mile away from the Sann Gate, had sixteen or seventeen graves earlier but now there are only four graves. The local inhabitants call it the Roman's graveyard.

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moenjodaro

Mohenjo-daro was a city of the Indus Valley Civilization, 20 km from Larkana and some 80 km southwest of modern Sukkur, Sindh, Pakistan. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and better preserved than Harappa. However, due to rain the upper part of tomb is now destroyed despite steps to further save this world historical place.

Ancient city on the bank of the Indus River, in present-day southern Pakistan

The site of Mohenjo-Daro (also Moenjo-daro, latitude 27 degrees, 25 minutes north, longitude 67 degrees 35 minutes east), in Larkana District, Sindh, Pakistan, is the largest and most extensively excavated Indus city in Pakistan.

This city would have dominated the major trade routes and agricultural potential of the southern Indus plain, from around 2600-1900 BCE.
Mohenjo-Daro is located in District Larkana at a distance of about 28 km from Larakana and 107 km from sukkur.
Mohenjo-Daro was a city located in the south of Modern Pakistan in the Sind Province, on the right bank of the Indus River. It was built between four and five thousand years ago, and lasted until 3,700 BP. It was part of the Harrapan Civilization, and the city had at least 35,000 residents. Mohenjo-Daro means “mound of the dead”.

The city was approximately one square mile in size. In 1922-1927 large scale excavations at Mohenjo-daro were carried out by R. D. Banarjee and continued by M. S. Vats and K. N. Dikshit under the direction of Sir John Marshall. E. J. H. MacKay carried out further excavations from 1927 to1931. Sir Mortimer Wheeler made small excavations in1950.
As a result of this extensive work almost one-third of the area of the old city was exposed, revealing for the first time the remains of one of the most ancient civilizations in the Indus Valley. Typical of most large and planned cities, Mohenjo-daro had planned city streets and buildings. The settlement was thought to house roughly 5,000 people, and had houses, a granary, baths, assembly halls and towers.
Mohenjo-Daro - largest city of the Indus Civilization
The site of Mohenjo-Daro (also Moenjo-daro, latitude 27 degrees, 25 minutes north, longitude 67 degrees 35 minutes east), in Larkana District, Sindh, Pakistan, is the largest and most extensively excavated Indus city in Pakistan.
Mohenjo-Daro - It was built around 2600 BC, and was abandoned around 1700 BC, probably due to a change of course of the river which supported the civilization.

Mohenjo-Daro - The high western mound is generally referred to as the "citadel" mound, but it is subdivided into several sectors.
The city was divided into two parts, the Citadel included an elaborate tank or bath created with fine quality brickwork and drains; this was surrounded by a verandah. Also located here was a giant granary, a large residential structure, and at least two aisled assembly halls. To the east of the citadel was the lower city, laid out in a grid pattern. The streets were straight, and were drained to keep the area sanitary. The people of the city used very little stone in their construction. They used two types of bricks- mud bricks, and wood bricks, which were created by burning wood.

They used timber to create the flat roofs of their buildings; there are brick stairways leading to the roofs of many houses. Some houses were small, and others were larger with interior courtyards. Most had small bathrooms. Potter’s kilns, dyer’s vats, as well as metalworking, bead making, and shell-working shops have all been discovered. The people were good at irrigation and flood control. However, when the Indus River changed its course around 3700 years ago, the civilization died.

All Indus valley sites including Mohenjo-daro and Harappa, were built according to a grid pattern plan. Each city had broad parallel streets which crossed each other to divide the city into compact rectangular blocks, and had an advanced and extensive drainage system. In addition to it's numerous other achievements Mohenjo-daro and other Indus sites made extensive use of baked brick (unlike the sun-dried brick typical of Mesopotamian civilization), which gave greater durability to all of its buildings.

Sindh The new epicenter of global instability

Taliban may cut AQ ties for peace Read Now for latest News, Photos

Sindh has always been a fertile and rich country. For thousands of years, it had maintained trade links with other countries, some of them in far-flung regions of the world. Historians have found evidence that ships carrying merchandise from Sindh regularly called at the ports of Egypt, Java, China and Sri Lanka. From these countries, goods such as gold and silver ornaments and precious stones found their way to the royal Sindhi courts and temples. Sindh's government treasuries had always been replete with gems and all types of treasure. In spite of their affluence, Sindhis always avoided to maintain large armies and to conquer the neighboring lands. On the contrary, invaders from outside gravitated to the riches of Sindh attacked the country a number of times and acquired so much wealth by loot and plunder that they dreamed of using that wealth to conquer other countries and extend their sway over the world. This is why all the intruders that have ruled India at times attempted to extend their jurisdiction over Sindh too.
Although we have no coherent accounts of the history of Sindh from the periods prior to the Arab rule, it is an established fact that everyone, from Persian invaders to Alexander the Great, who attempted to conquer India, acquired Sindh too and had a free  plunge in the country's riches. The Arabs wanted Sindh for its wealth to finance their expeditions further deep into India. Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf[1] had dispatched his general, Muhammad bin Qasim, with express directions to seize the treasures of Aror and Multan (North Sindh) and occupy all regions of India up to the frontiers of China. Mahmud of Ghazna, the inveterate plunderer, also wanted the treasures of Somnath to finance his Indian expeditions. The principality of Somnath at that time had acquired the status of a regional hub of trade for Sindh and Gujrat. After the conquest of Sindh by the Arabs,  Sindhi traders chose to make Somnath their commercial and financial capital, as they considered their wealth more secure in Somnath away from the reach of the Arab marauders who controlled much of the western parts of Sindh. Such was the glitter and allure of the gems and treasure accumulated in Somnath that it tempted Mahmud to descend several times from cold northern valleys beyond the Karakorams thousands of miles down south into the hot tropics of India to quench his lust for pillage and plunder. After a number of attempts and several years Mahmud was finally able to take over Somnath but fortunately by then he was too wearied and too old to further carry on with his nefarious designs and soon after he died.
Zahiruddin Babar too eyed the treasures of Sindh to finance his Indian expeditions. Although Babar did not himself attack Sindh, he extended his reign to Kandhar whose ruler Shah Beg Arghun took refuge in the plains of Sindh and eventually conquered it. It is one of the poignant episodes of the history of Sindh that its enemies at various junctures have put aside their differences and partnered in the exploitation of the country. Shah Beg Arghun after conquering Sindh had Babar's name chanted in the weekly Juma prayer sermons as the current Muslim Caliph. Although this move legally put Sindh under the suzerainty of Kandhar and effectively made Arghun the deputy or viceroy of Babar, the strategy earned Arghun time to consolidate his hold on Sindh. The Arghun army, after taking possession of the treasures of Sindh, ransacked and despoiled the culturally rich and affluent city of Thatta, and reduced the internationally famed metropolis to a virtual graveyard. When there was nothing left to rob, the army began tearing apart houses to extract timber and other building material. A sizable portion of the wealth thus looted made its way to Kandhar and enabled Babar to raise a large army to attack India and establish the Mughal Empire. There is no denying the fact that Britain could only firm up their control on all of India after they were able to have Sindh. In 1843, when they annexed Sindh, Bahadur Shah Zafar ruled India and just within fourteen years the British forces were able to put a seal on the Mughal rule in India. The economy of Sindh was very important to the British rulers and they at several occasions rejected the demand of the Punjab for more share in the water from the river Indus—although the Punjab was asking for the favor to irrigate the lands that the British government in India had allotted to army men from the province as reward for the latter's services to the Crown. The British did not choose to disappoint their loyal Punjabi subjects, who had served them through thick and thin and helped them quell every insurgency and revolt, just because they were driven by the values of justice and natural rights. But definitely they were fascinated by Sindh and could not afford to adversely affect Sindh's revenues and economic output which constituted a sizable portion of the colonial government's income.
In the present times, the military establishment of Pakistan is dependent on the economic potential of Sindh, which contributes about 70 percent of Pakistan's GDP. In addition, the country has been exploiting the vast coal, oil and natural gas resources of Sindh for decades. Sindh thus bears the costs of maintaining the 700,000-plus defense establishment of Pakistan and its nuclear arsenal. If Sindh stops injecting funds in the national income of Pakistan, the country would not be able to maintain its military and the Pakistan government would collapse under its own burden. At this stage, it would not be appropriate to segue into a discussion of the raison d'être of maintaining a large military for protecting the borders of any country. It would be just appropriate to  note that presently Pakistan army has been made to fight the Taliban and Islamic extremists and embark upon an effort to contain Islamic militancy in the country. In this situation, both the Pakistan army and the Islamic militants need financial resources to be able to keep fighting. The Taliban had seized Swat and adjoining areas not just to have a sanctuary in the tribal belt for themselves but also to take control of the emerald mines and other precious stones quarries in the region. They not only sold emerald extracted from the Swat valley, but they also raised funds by auctioning off the assets of the government and multinational companies in the areas under their control. Before the army launched its operation in the area a few weeks ago, the Taliban held weekly auctions in Swat to sell off the government and multinational assets and traders from all parts of Pakistan, especially the Punjab, participated in those auctions.
Wars, whether fought against insurgents like the Taliban or for conquering the world, incur tremendous costs. To continue waging their so-called Jihad, the Taliban need more than the funds raised by selling the gemstones and war booty. While it can be argued that the primitive and crude Taliban may not be tuned in to the intricacies of economics, but
Pakistan's establishment is well grounded in the economic realities and are unambiguously aware that how the country earns its income and which part of the country is economically most important. Western countries, particularly the United
States, have time and again voiced their concern that the Taliban enjoy an active and wholesome support of the army and military agencies of Pakistan. These concerns cannot be shrugged off in the face of the fact that Pakistan Army first actively supported and nurtured Afghan Mujahedeen against the Soviet Union and later made those Mujahedeen into the Taliban and kept patronizing them. Like their traditional friends in Pakistan army, the Taliban also know that it is Sindh which keeps infusing blood in the anemic economy of Pakistan. In this backdrop, one can justifiably claim that resettlement in Sindh of the internally displaced persons (IDPs) from Swat is part of a strategic plan to further entrench the colonial-style vested interests in Sindh which have recently been apprehensive of losing out to the new dynamics of globalization in the area. In the light of the symbiotic relation between the army and the Taliban, it would be unrealistic to ignore the thrust of these protagonists to consolidate their hold on Sindh and its resources before the realities of globalization make it difficult for them to unabashedly keep skimming off the surplus Sindh produces. Resettlement of IDPs in Sindh thus emerges as a very clever move: 1. to sustain the Pakistani establishment's control on the resources of Sindh, 2. to permanently mutilate the Sufi and secular traditions of Sindh and thus extinguish the well-corroborated Sindhi pride that Sindhi youth has always been loath to participate in any type of terrorism. Both the Taliban and Pakistani agencies are adroitly making their moves and this time Sindh happens to be the chess board. According to the leader of Pashtuns in Sindh, Shahi Syed, there are four million Pashtuns in Karachi and nobody is able to make an accurate estimate of the number of the Taliban or members of Al-Qaeda among them. According to estimates, there is a combined population of between seven and eight million Pashtuns in Sindh, which include Afghanis, people from tribal areas, and ordinary Pathans. Although a vast majority of them is settled in Karachi, at least a quarter of this Pashtun population is dispersed in other parts of the province.
Never in history has Sindh suffered so great an influx of outsiders as it has after the creation of Pakistan. First it was the Indian refugees immediately after the Partition in 1947—a vast majority of which was cleverly guided into Sindh and these refugees, who call themselves Mohajirs, kept trickling in for many decades to come. Then it was the notorious One Unit[2] which enabled the Pakistani establishment (the Punjab-dominated civil and military bureaucracy) to settle millions of Punjabis in Sindh. Following the teachings of Machiavelli, the rulers[3] planted pockets of non-native population in various parts of Sindh—in addition to Karachi, there are whole villages and small towns populated by the Punjabi settlers in the interior of Sindh. During the Afghan war in the 1980s, hundreds of thousands of Afghan immigrants made Sindh their permanent home. Now it is the turn of displaced Swatis to head toward the universal sanctuary for the destitute, the displaced and refugees—called Sindh. According to media reports so far about 1.8 million people have been displaced and the town of Swat has been completely abandoned. The problem is not only Swat, the military operation is set to expand to Mingora and the adjoining areas up to Peshawar and the stream of refugees is not going to abate. If most of these IDPs get settled in Sindh, the precarious ethnic balance in Sindh will tilt in favor of the migrants and the Sindhis will be permanently reduced to a minority in their own homeland.
History bears out that whenever Sindhis have been able to self-rule, they have disseminated love and peace and busied themselves in the creation of arts and literature, in cultural activities, in trade and commerce, and, in the process, established and nurtured high civilizations. But whenever Sindh has slipped into the control of outsiders, its wealth has been utilized for regional disruption, war and egotistical pursuits. Because Sindh is the land of Sufis and Sindhis are eternally peace-loving, religious extremism has never endured in Sindh except for intermittent bouts in the times of foreign rule and within the settlements the foreigners established. Sindhis can continue to follow the teachings of the Sufi saints, and conduct themselves as liberal, tolerant, and peace-loving people, only if they will remain in majority in their homeland.
History is full of accounts of migrations and re-settlements, but there has always been a limit to influx of immigrants in a country. One finds no precedence that outside rulers have attempted to resettle their whole towns and cities into their dominions or colonies. The six-decade long state-sponsored resettlement process in Sindh is unique with no parallel anywhere in the world and any time in the history of mankind. The total desertion of Swat in the wake of military operation gives rise to many pertinent questions. Is it sheer failure of Pakistan army or is it part of a well-planned strategy? There are only a few thousand refugees in the camps established by the government and international agencies, while those rendered homeless are estimated at about two million and hundreds of thousands are heading to Sindh! Hordes of them have settled in the districts of Tando Muhammd Khan, Hyderabad, Jamshoro, Dadu, and Karachi and the local Pashtuns in Sindh are receiving the refugees and establishing camps for them. If the Pakistan government is once again up to its old strategy of raking in charity money and stirring the conscience of the world into pumping in more funds in the name of IDPs, the civilized world should not allow themselves to be duped into sacrificing Sindh, Sindhis, and their
5000-year old culture of peace and nonviolence at the altar of this game of strategic compassion contrived by Pakistani agencies. The United States must revisit its current policy and evaluate the causes of past failures in the region. Every time the US took on the Taliban or Islamic militants, the latter slipped out with the help of their inveterate allies in Pakistan army. From Afghanistan the militants infiltrated into Iraq and then into Pakistani tribal areas, and now they are all set to make Sindh their new battleground. In this situation, the United States, instead of wasting time with Pakistan army in the desolate mountains of Swat and tribal areas, ought to concentrate on preventing the influx  of IDPs and thus, the Taliban into Sindh, because if Islamic militants get into Sindh, this land of Sufis will turn into an epicenter of talibanization. Sindh can keep its traditions of peace and religious liberalism only if it is able to keep intact the shrines of Sufi saints—both the Hindus and Muslims among Sindhis revere these saints and pay homage to them. The Taliban are notorious for their intolerance toward Sufi saints and they indulged in the shameful acts of destroying Sufi shrines and other symbols of religious tolerance and diversity in Afghanistan. In the absence of these emblems of Sufism in Sindh, there will be mushrooming of madrasahs – churning out multitudes of young talibs ever ready to blow off themselves and everyone else. Pakistan shares borders with India and India has sustained all invasions from the northwest. After the Taliban are able to entrench themselves in Sindh, they will be knocking at the doors of India and their militancy will conveniently spill into India. It may be intentional on the part of those-who-matter in Pakistan, to let India experience the real lightning of Islamic extremism after having them encounter its faint sparks during the Mumbai terror last year. Will it be prudent for the world's sole super power to let Islamic terrorists broaden the reach of their activities to Sindh and India? The Taliban phenomenon will shatter Indian economy and weaken the country both internally and externally.
Pakistan army which has thrived on enmity with India has contrived this game to circumvent the international pressure that it should focus on its north-western tribal region rather than on its eastern border with India. It appears a calculated move to blur the difference between the army's new, but unwelcome, enemy and its traditionally favorite foe. The Taliban operating in Sindh will acquire way more strategic importance than their present situation and can nudge China to come open in their support as China considers India its military and economic rival. In that situation, the United States will permanently lose its war against terror. It is in the geostrategic interests of both India and the United States to prevent the influx of the Taliban into Sindh.

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