Terrorism-Impact on Cultural Heritage Of Punjab Province In Pakistan

Mussa Iqbal

Mussaiqbalgill@gmail.com

Introduction :

Pakistan is known as a traditional country in among Asian countries and stands different due to a
different identity of its culture. Pakistan having five provinces and every province having its own culture
which make them different and identical to known very easily among many people that who belongs to
which province on the basis of language, clothing, styling and comprises numerous ethnic groups
the Punjabis, Potwaris, Kashmiris, Sindhis in east Muhajirs, Makrani in the south Baloch ,
Hazaras and Pashtuns in the west and the Dards , Wakhi , Shinaki communities in the north. Punjab
known as rich architectural landmarks of Mughal Era’s but the terrorism which is very actively known
Until Pakistan became a key ally in the War on Terrorism, the US Secretary of State included Pakistan on
the 1993 list of countries which repeatedly provide support for acts of international terrorism. Since the
unrest is spread in all Pakistan, Punjab suffers a lot of terrorist attacks which makes Punjab unsafe and
damaged its heritage value. In 2012 Pakistani leadership sat down to sought out solutions for dealing
with the menace of terrorism and in 2013 political parties unanimously reached a resolution on Monday
9 September 2013 at the All Parties Conference (APC), stating that negotiation with the militants should
be pursued as their first option to counter-terrorism [3].

1.1 Punjab’s Historical heritage cultural:

Punjab has many historical places which draws the beauty of Mughal Empire and shows a deep
knowledge of late Era but due to many attacks terrorism got deep roots in the soil of Punjab.
Heritage music of Punjab which was very famous and having a different mark for Punjab’s people
who found peace by enjoying such music in big places which started to ban due to terror attack.
Aanarkali’s most famous food street The blast was triggered by a time-device bomb. The blast
occurred on the night of Saturday on 6 July 2013[4]. This incident creates a wave of threat to go on
that place again by that the cultural value of this historical heritage goes underneath due to
terrorism.
1.2 War on Terrorism :
Many countries are suffering and face high impact of terrorism on their daily lives, developed and
developing countries all over the world bearing it on hardship. Pakistan comes up with highest
rating where terrorism shows highest rating in causalities and damages of culture and heritage
values. Punjab is the biggest province of Pakistan and rich with different and attractive architecture
and cultural values which effected badly due to war on terrorism and Pakistan stood as alliance
with international terrorism controlled squad and spend so much for this including so many lives.
This war is still continue since 2001 when United states of America hit with terror attack on World
trade center and international war on terrorism begins officially.

Conclusion:

Pakistan has lots of potential heritage places which defines the face of culture in term of different arts
and states and Pakistan’s largest and heritage value enriched province Punjab has such landmarks
whose values make it state of art to prove the Punjab a cultural state but the bad factors involved in the
form terrorism badly effected on the position and worth of heritage cultural description, on the certain
level people of Punjab thinks that they are not safe even inside the home and stop doing outdoor
activities due to that tourism and cultural program events which helps to connect people with their
traditional roots were stopped. This problem caused a big impact on culture and traditional values for
the new generation and they found their own concerned western culture with more attractive features.
Terror attacks made Punjab even Pakistan in critical situations and far away from its cultural and
heritage values.

References:

1. International Terrorism: Threats and Responses: Hearings Before the Committee on the
Judiciary By United States Congress House Committee on the Judiciary, ISBN 0-16-052230-7,
1996, pp. 482.
2. Journal of Political Studies, Vol. 18, Issue - 2, 2011: 17-36 17 The Role of Media in Creating
Values of Nationalism in Pakistan Munawar Sabir.

3. Hassan Abbas. Pakistan's Drift Into Extremism: Allah, The Army, And America's War On Terror,
M.E. Sharpe, 2004. ISBN 0-7656-1497-9

4. Ali, Nosheen. "Books vs Bombs? Humanitarian development and the narrative of terror in
Northern Pakistan." Third World Quarterly. Volume 31, Issue 4, 2010 ("Special Issue: Relocating
Culture in Development and Development in Culture"). p. 541-559. DOI:
 10.1080/01436591003701075. Published online on 28 June 2013. Available
on EBSCOHostAcademic Search Complete, Accession number 51818440.

5. Defence and Peace Economics, 2007, Vol. 18(3), June, pp. 245–252 ISSN 1024-2694 print: ISSN
1476-8267 online © 2007 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/10242690600951664 PROTECTING
CULTURAL MONUMENTS AGAINST TERRORISM BRUNO S. FREYa AND DOMINIC ROHNER.

6. National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism. (2016). Global
Terrorism Database(globalterrorismdb_0616dist.xlsx). Retrieved
from https://www.start.umd.edu/gtd University of Maryland.