Silence Must End on Pakistan Occupied Balochistan

There must be sustained political and diplomatic efforts to expose the reality of Pakistan Occupied Balochistan.

- SANTISHREE DHULIPUDI PANDIT

In the long and unfinished history of betrayals in South Asia, few episodes are as deliberately buried and as morally outrageous as the annexation of Balochistan by Pakistan. The world calls it Balochistan, but what we must learn to say frankly is Pakistan-Occupied Balochistan. A land occupied by deceit. Irony is how its people are colonized not by outsiders but by those who claim to be their own. A sad tragedy of trust turned into trauma by the Pakistani leadership.

In March 1948, the so-called accession of the Khanate of Kalat was not some natural unfolding of national integration. It was an act of coercion, carried out under the shadow of threats, backroom deals, and brute military force. This was a betrayal of the highest order, even by the standards of post-colonial cynicism. And yet, while history books in Pakistan glorify this as a "merger", and Western capitals remain conveniently complacent, the Baloch people know what really happened. They have not and could not forget, and neither should we.

One should also remember that Kalat was an independent princely state under British suzerainty. When the British left, Kalat declared its independence on 11 August 1947, just three days before Pakistan was created. It signed a standstill agreement with Pakistan, much like Hyderabad and other princely states did with India. But Mohammad Ali Jinnah—yes, the same man who spoke of constitutionalism and legalism—soon decided that Balochistan's independence was unacceptable. Within months, Kalat was swallowed into Pakistan, with the Khan forced to sign an "instrument of accession" under duress. Could this be called integration? Or shouldn't we just call it what it is—an occupation that continues till today?