In 1947, Peshawar became part of the newly created Pakistan after
politicians from the Frontier decided to join the state. While a large
majority of people approved this action, a small minority, including Abdul Ghaffar Khan,
believed that South Asians could form a confederation; however, the
call for a united India was deeply unpopular with the local people. A
small, but powerful, minority believed that the province should have
been absorbed into Afghanistan, because Peshawar had been part of
Afghanistan before the British connected it to the rest of India. There
was also a call for the creation of Pashtunistan,
an independent state separate from both Pakistan and Afghanistan. At
the time most of the population of Peshawar were Pashtuns who spoke Peshawari Pashto, a dialect of native tongue of Afghanistan.
Until the mid-1950s, Peshawar was enclosed within a city wall and
sixteen gates. Of the old city gates, the most famous was the "Kabuli
Gate", and in January 2012, an announcement was made by Siraj Ahmed
Khan, the Peshawar District Coordination Officer at the time: "In due
course of time, all the gates around the old city will be restored." —
Imran Rasheed, an author who has written extensively on the history of
Peshawar has explained:
Old Peshawar was divided into three separate walled communities, Gunj, Dhaki Nalbandi and Sard Chah quarters. Under the Sikhs, the Italian mercenary governor of Peshawar, General Paolo Avitabile, popularly known as Abu Tabela, demolished the walls around these quarters and built a single wall around the old city.[29]
Peshawar's size or capacity has not grown in direct proportion to the
city's population and pollution and overcrowding have negatively
impacted upon the city in modern times. In addition to the increase in
population, the high number of Afghan transportation vehicles that pass
through the city have contributed to the degradation of the city's air
quality:
Carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, smoke, dust, hydrocarbons and tetraethyl lead are the main components of vehicular emissions poured into the urban air. Fuel adulteration and use of ill-maintained vehicles enhances emissions from motor vehicle exhaust. A large amount of suspended dust is generated due to vehicles driving on unpaved road shoulders, poorly maintained and overcrowded roads. In Peshawar, being a boarder city of Afghanistan, the large influx of Afghan transporters has greatly increased the problem of air pollution.[30]
During the Soviet war in Afghanistan in the 1980s, Peshawar served as a political centre for the CIA and the Inter-Services Intelligence-trained mujahideen groups based in the camps of Afghan refugees, such as at the refugee camp of Jalozai.
Soviet agents often infiltrated these organisations and violence often
erupted on Peshawar's streets, as it was the scene of a proxy conflict
between Soviet agents and US-backed insurgents.
There was a total of approximately 100,000 Afghans registered in Peshawar during the 1988 election, when Benazir Bhutto was running for Prime Minister of Pakistan; although, in addition to this estimate, hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees were in the city "illegally".[31]
The Afghans rebuked being labeled as illegal citizens, since they claim
Peshawar belongs to Afghanistan and was illegally taken away from them
to be given to British backed India by the British. Many of the ethnic
Pashtun Afghans reside in Peshawar with relative ease and many still
remain in Peshawar since to them it is home.
As of 2012, Peshawar continues to link Pakistan with Afghanistan and
Central Asia. Peshawar has emerged as an important regional city of
Pakistan and the city remains a focal point for Pashtun culture. Like the surrounding region, Peshawar was at the crossroads of the struggle between the extremist Taliban
and moderates, liberals, and Pashtun nationalists. As a demonstration
of their determination to destroy Pashtun icons, the Pakistani Taliban
bombed the shrine of the Pashtun poet, Rahman Baba, in 2009.[32]
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