Life hangs by a prayer for Danish, 9

Danish Khan is nine. Like many others of his age, he led an innocent existence. His world revolved around friends at Al Razi School in his native Kabal village, in the picturesque Swat valley, and his neighbourhood.

But his world came crashing about two weeks ago, after the army moved into the village of 5,000 as part of an offensive against the Taliban. He had to leave the village in two hours, along with his parents and three sisters. They ran for their lives to escape the fighting, travelling on foot and by bus to Karachi.

Danish and family are among hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people who have had to leave home and seek refugee elsewhere. There is no word from the government on numbers, but aid workers put the figure at over two million, making it one of the worst refugee crises in the world.

Thousands live in makeshift camps, many more with relatives or people belonging to their tribes, in towns and cities across Pakistan. According to Ishak Sethi, spokesperson of the Swat Qaumi Ittehad, there are 35,000 displaced people from Swat living with relatives in Karachi alone.

Danish and his family of six have sought refugee with a relative in Ittehad town, Karachi’s equivalent of Mumbai’s Dharavi. Others have been put up in a local school, with many families crammed into single rooms. They have got by for a fortnight on the generosity of relatives and fellow tribesmen.

But this grassroots charity is beginning to take its toll. As fighting continues and more refugees pour in, infrastructure around shanty towns like Ittehad, Benares, and Kaidabad is strained to the limit. In the initial stages of influx, people opened their homes and gave food. But their meagre resources are now at breaking point, though local councillor Sartaj Khan insists that they are “honour-bound to look after them.”

Ittehad, home to most refugees in the city, sticks out like a sore thumb compared to the stately seafront bungalows in upmarket Clifton, en route to the shanty town. Amid the strapping Pathans around us, Danish stands out with the poignant look on his face. As we begin chatting about his experiences, his eyes swell up.

In recent days, he has been through some of the worst experiences that will live with him forever. He has seen a man being beheaded by the Taliban, the non-stop bombardment by the army, and the midnight flight from his home. Some months ago, the Taliban took control of his town and shut down the local girls’ school, forcing his five-year-old sister Irum and many others to stay at home. Later, they forbade boys from playing cricket. When they began a recruitment drive in school, Danish refused to sign up.

“I did not like their decision to shut down my sister’s school,” he said. “She cried non-stop for two days.” The boy’s dislike turned to revulsion when the Taliban beheaded a man from his village. “Yeh ek azeem zulm hai (This is the worst kind of oppression),” he said.

Though a fortnight has passed, the events are still fresh in his mind. Sleep is difficult to come by, and when he catches a wink, he gets nightmares. “I will never be able to forget this all my life,” he said.

But it’s not the Taliban alone whom he blames for his troubles. “The army first allowed these people to wreak havoc with our lives,” he said. “Now they have forced us to leave our homes.”

But what is remarkable is the boy’s determination to carve out a future for himself and his family, away from their hellish experiences. He wants to get away from it all. “I want to study and get a job quickly in Dubai so that I can get my family out of hell,” he said. “I also want to help my father educate my sisters.”

There are thousands of people like Danish, each with a poignant tale of his own, all of them victims of the Taliban’s zealotry and brutality on the one hand and the army onslaught on the other. “We are paying the price for our leaders’ mistakes,” said one man. “They built monsters, gave them arms, and now the monsters have begun to devour the whole state.”

There was unanimity in a group I interacted with at a local school about how things have been mismanaged. “They should have acted against them many years ago,” said some. Many in the crowd complained how they were being victimised by both sides. “The Taliban brutalises us while the army suspects all those speaking Pashtu of being pro-Taliban,” said Karim Khan.

As we say our goodbyes, Danish shakes my hand vigorously and whispers. “Mai apni zindagi badalna chahata hoon. Mere lye dua karna (Pray for me. I want to change my life).” For Danish and countless victims of zealotry and violence, life hangs by a prayer.