Will Gwadar become another Hambantota?

Gwadar has been a fishing village since history began. Its location on the southern coast of modern Balochistan meant that its inhabitants had to live off locally caught fish and depend on seasonal showers for potable water.

- F S AIJAZUDDIN

The tribes there encountered by Alexander the Great during his retreat across Makran in 325 BC were described by his historian Arrian as Ichthyophagi or fish-eaters """a hairy race, with long nails with which they used to divide their fish, and they used for weapons wooden pikes hardened with fire""".

Alexander led one group of his troops over land while his admiral Nearchus took the rest in ships sailing along the coast. Alexander, misled by scouts, lost his way. Along with his troops, he had to endure a summer's heat and a punishing scarcity of water.

According to one account, Alexander, when offered a helmet containing precious water, poured it into the sand "in front of his men, rather than drink when they could not".

Makran had not changed much even 2,000 years later. Surveying it in 1896, the English geographer Col T.H. Holdich wondered "what manner of madness could have induced him to select such a route". Holdich recognised the descendants of the "fish-eaters", remarking that not only did they eat fish but "fish enters into the food of dogs, cats, camels and cattle".