Bugti buried, grandsons for war

ISLAMABAD: Nawaz Akbar Khan Bugti, the deceased Baluch nationalist leader, was laid to rest on Friday at his ancestral graveyard in the Dera Bugti area of the trouble-stricken Baluchistan province, although the military authorities did not allow anyone to see his dead body.

 

According to government sources, the dead body of Akbar Bugti was retrieved late on Thursday night from the rubble of a cave in which he was hiding before being killed by the Pakistani security forces in a massive military operation on August 26. The body was taken to Dera Bugti on Friday morning and directly taken to the late tribal chief’s ancestral graveyard there. Ironically, the government had announced that not more than six of his family members would be allowed to attend his funeral. The government further announced that the body would not be handed over to the family and the burial would be taken place by the local administration. This infuriated his sons who decided not to attend the funeral.

 

Despite repeated demands by the journalists present on the occasion, the military authorities did not allow them to have a look at the face of the dead body. According to the Inter Services Public Relations Director General Major General Shaukat Sultan, the dead body was badly mutilated and stinking and it could not be shown to anyone. “We can say in medical terms that the dead body was in an advanced stage of decay and it was examined by doctors before being taken to Dera Bugti. He said the body was identified from the watch Bugti used to wear and his glasses.

 

According to Bugti’s son-in-law Agha Shahid Bugti, “It is simply inhuman and unacceptable and even un-Islamic to bury a person against the will of his family. No one from the Bugti family went for the funeral. It was only our right to decide a burial place for him. We had been insisting  to the government that the body should be handed to us. On Friday, we were told that the body has been taken for burial”. Nobody even bothered to offer the funeral prayers and it was buried in the presence of the Army personnel. He said it was a widely held view in Baluchistan that Bugti had died following a bitter shootout with military personnel in the open. Our suspicion is confirmed by the government’s refusal hand over the body to his heir.

 

According to Jamil Bugti and Talal Bugti, the sons of Bugti, “We are still alive and present in Quetta, and yet the body of our father was handed over to his khaki opponents. We are not sure if the body buried is that of our father”. Meanwhile, the two grandsons of Bugti, Brahamdad Bugti and Ali Nawaz Bugti, who were earlier feared dead, have reportedly surfaced and established contact with their relatives in Quetta. Both the grandsons have issued a statement that they would be leading the Baluch people in a war against Musharraf, the killer of their grandfather.