PARTITION - additional recordings / Andrew Whitehead / ______________________________________I CD-30 KHAN SHAH AFRIDI Interviewed in Pashto by Haroon Rashid in the village of Mattni near Peshawar, May 2003; photos taken Haroon’s translation We were asked by Pir of Manki Sharif to come for fighting. I was Pir’s follower si I asked that they will have to go, come what may. This was Pir sahib’s orders to fight the Hindus in Kashmir. HOW MANY WRE IN THE LASHKARS THAT WENT TO FIGHT? There were a lot. Mohmands came and we Afridis were there as well. Everyone carried his own weapons. I had a small shotgun at that time. Pira sahib told us we will fight and get ready and we should not be afraid. We will fight. It is a war between Muslims and infidels, and we will get Kashmir freed. We went beyond Baramulla. We were 8 to 10 kms from Srinagar. I was a member and was mainly organiser of people. I used to tell them after an attack that you have come here to fight not to run away like chickens. You will not run. I was commanding the. They were a lot - roughly 120. We had two vehicles to travel in. On the way we fought in uri and Baramulla. We spent a night in Baramulla. They slept there. We had no army commaned with us. God is here, God is here. Yes, there was some looting. It was done by people from Azahail [?] near Baramulla. No, we did not put our hands on women. We did not do anything wrong. We did not put our hands on wrong things. Every group had his own leader. We returned when we were attacked and beaten up by aeroplanes and artillery. We all took shelter in the fields. We received a lot of losses of men and we were also disgraced. A large number of people died in those attacks Khashem [?] Khan of Azahail [?] died and others. We reached our maximum point forward in three or four days. We shot whoever we saw in Baramulla. We did not know how many we killed. We forced Hindus to run for their lives. By God, I don’t know if there were any Christians in Baramulla. Yes, yes. We saw Pir of Manki Sharif there. He was present in Baramulla himself. He was alone and asked us to fight. He told us that those who wished to go back will not be provided fuel for their vehicles. The tribesmen told the Pir they would have their own fuel as they want to show up in their villages alive, to show them that they came back safe and sound. The local people in Kashmir were cordial to us. They would give us bread, milk and other - whatever they could spare. They were happy on our arrival. I remember Christians in Baramulla. Our leader Saurbat [?] Khan was not a good man. He used to put hands on these people. A lot of people from here were martyred. They suffered losses and we too. No one from government helped us. We took our own weapons and bullets with us. We fought on our own. I hope may Allah give freedom to Kashmir, and in