Arrested Trees, Stupas and Tamerlane’s Prison

A Road Trip through the Khyber Pass, 2019

By: Shameelah R. Balkhi (MS Yale), Durriyah Balkhi Asghar (CPA)

A signboard at the entrance of the Khyber Pass

Barren, greyish-brown and dusty all around. As we travelled through the Safed Koh (Spin Ghar)
mountains of the Hindukush Range there was not a speck of green anywhere in sight. In fact,
not a speck of any colour at all. The deep blue sky was in sharp contrast. We had come to see
the famous Khyber Pass and our destination was Fort Michni.
A few kilometres past the smugglers’ bazar of Karkhano is the famous Baab-e-Khyber
monument arching over the road leading to the border with Afghanistan. The Baab-e-Khyber
monument, built in the 60’s, is unremarkable. What had we come to see in this God-forsaken
place? Decades later I still wondered why the Baab-e-Khyber had been chosen to adorn the RS

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 10 note when there are so many grander
structures in Pakistan. But our faithful
cousin had all the answers and our guided
tour through this 53 km long stretch,
known famously as the Khyber Pass, was
a rich experience.
Just a few kilometres from Peshawar,
next to the Baab-e-Khyber at the mouth
of the Khyber Pass, we first passed the
Jamrud Fort. It was rebuilt by the Sikhs in 1823 on the site of an earlier fort. Then came the
Shagai Fort and then the Ali Masjid Fort. Here is a shrine dedicated to the fourth Caliph of Islam,
whom it is believed came here, prayed here, and left the impression of his hand on a boulder
that was thrown at him. Apparently even the name of the pass “Khyber”, is the same as the
Khyber of Arabia where he distinguished himself.

Shagai Fort, Khyber Pass

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 Railway tunnels beaded through the mountains

The most charming sight along our route was of railway tunnels; quaint, brick-faced, black holes
disappearing into hills. The
British had to construct 43
of them to get trains from
Peshawar to Landi Kotal in
the 1920s. During the three
Afghan Wars fought by the
British in the 19th and early
20th centuries, they paid
dearly to keep their supply
route through the Khyber
Pass open.
Arriving at Fort Michni, or
Michni Picquet, was
exciting. It was like
stepping into a castle from
Fort Michni
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medieval times that was still required in the modern world. At 3,600 feet above sea level it
offered a great view all around. Snow-capped mountain tops of the Hindukush, deep inside
Afghanistan, were also visible from here.

The road leading down to Torkham, snow-capped mountains and Jalalabad in the distance

The Michni Checkpost is the last point that

tourists-with-permits are allowed to go to. As we
looked down, trucks wound their way along the
serpentine road to the Torkham border crossing
with Afghanistan that was only 4 km away.
After the journalist, Yvonne Ridley, had illegally
snuck into Afghanistan, and was detained by the
Taliban for 11 days, it was at Torkham that she
was handed back to Pakistani officials in 2001.
The Huns had built a series of hill forts all over
this region for defense. These were pointed out

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to us and we were also briefed that the sloping, covered corridor type tunnel on the hilltop
slightly to the left, was the killing cell of Taimur Lang’s prison. It chopped and minced people up
as they hurtled down inside it. No appetite for that!

Tamerlane’s prison on a hill overlooking Afghanistan

After our tour of Fort Michni, we retraced our

steps to the Khyber Rifles Officers’ Mess in
Landi Kotal. Its expansive lawns had a perfectly
functioning sundial from 1923.
The Mess also has a Diana Room where Lady
Diana spent a few hours, as well as the sofa set
Quaid-e-Azam and Fatima Jinnah sat on when
they visited in 1948. John and Jacqueline
Kennedy are other notables who have signed
the Visitors Books on display here.

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But what we were most amused to see was the arrested tree!

Photo 5. The arrested tree at Landi Kotal

A big, old Banyan tree in Landi Kotal has been under arrest for over 118 years! Thick chains hold
it to the ground so that it doesn’t run away! A plaque next to it describes the circumstances of
its arrest. British officers of the Khyber Rifles were having their drinks on the lawn, when one of
them felt that the tree was moving. He ordered it to stop, and when it didn’t, he gave orders for
its arrest. The tree has been in chains ever since!

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The Aryans in 1500 BC, the Persians of the Achaemenian Empire in the 6th century BC, the
armies of Alexander the Great in 326 BC, the Huns 5-8 CE, Changez Khan and the Mongol
hordes 13-14 CE, then the Mughal and Afghan armies in the following centuries, all came into
the subcontinent using the Khyber Pass. The Khyber Pass is also the route through which
Ahmad Shah Abdali came, on Shah Waliullah’s request, to stem the tide of the Marhatha
slaughter. After defeating the Marhatha and reinstating the Muslim government, he returned
to Afghanistan.

A push in the reverse direction had been in the time of the Mauriya Empire 322-185 BC when
Buddhism flourished, especially under Ashoka, and was taken as far as Balkh and Bukhara.
Buddhism was the dominant religion of this region by the 1st century BC and we passed several

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stupas on our way through the
Khyber Pass. The Kushan Dynasty was
also Buddhist and the conspicuous
Sphola Stupa (Khyber Topee) and the
stupa near Ali Masjid Fort are
probably of this era, 1-3 CE, or later.
A pass is like a bridge that allows
people to cross into an area that is
otherwise inaccessible. The Khyber
Pass is the most northerly mountain
pass connecting Central Asia with the
Indian subcontinent. A part of the
ancient Silk Route, it is 1 km at its
widest and 16 m at its narrowest.
Is this route still important? 80% of
the supplies to NATO forces, since
the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001,
go through the Khyber Pass and the
diplomatic crisis of 2010 resulted
from Pakistan having sealed off this
route after three of her soldiers were
killed by NATO bombing.
Each village in this sparsely populated
stretch is constructed like a fort and
every hilltop houses a picquet
manned by the Frontier Force. The
Khyber Pass is not the place for a
pretty holiday but where else will you
see a tree under arrest, roughly 15
centuries-old stupas and the artery
supplying the world’s biggest war? An open door at Fort Michni

Published: IBA Alumni Magazine, Jul-Sep 2019