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Balakot (; ; ) is a town in Mansehra district, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. The town was significantly damaged during the 2005 Kashmir earthquake but was later rebuilt with the assistance of the Government of Pakistan.
The lower area below Balakot, sometimes referred to as Nainsukh Valley, is temperate, while Kaghan Valley above Balakot City is cold enough to turn the whole area to freezing in the winter. Kaghan Valley is a pleasant summer destination. Its upper part from Naran upstream lacks the monsoon, but the lower part gets it well, and so it is forested.
When the Pakhli was conquered by Swatis from Turks then after the first "Vesh of Swatis" in 1703, Balakot city and Baffa city was given to Sarkheli sub-section which is further divided into 6 Khels, viz Lughmanis, Khawaja Khels, Bejori, Teetwal and Dodyari. These Khels own majority lands of Balakot upto present era.
Archaeologists from Hazara University, however, have found terracotta remains and terracotta figurines from distant points at high altitudes around the area. They might shed light on earlier inhabitants of the area. Old graveyards also suggest linkages towards pre-Muslim occupants who later converted to Islam.
According to book Seerat-e-Syed Ahmed, when he came to Balakot for the first time, he took refugee in the Haveli of Wasil Khan Swati, the powerful Chief and Khan of Balakot at that time.
Balakot was a refuge for Mujahideen after being ousted from Swabi and Amb. The Sikh Empire, who outnumbered the ill-prepared Mujahideen, defeated them. For the sake of this event, Balakot City is sometimes also referred to as Sarzameen-e-Shuhada ("The Land of ").
Mahtab Singh, a writer of the history of Hazara, writes that Sikhs, to stop the movement from continuing any further, reopened the grave of Syed Ahmad and set the body into the Kunhar River, probably in Talhata, 10 km down stream.
Sikh rule was brutal and fearsome and ended after James Abbot's capture of Hazara region. There have been many skirmishes between locals and Sikh forces. One famous event happened in 1844 when Gulab Singh, Maharaja of Kashmir, sent a campaign to the Chilas under Diwan Ibrahim, which was effectively destroyed by local populations in Kaghan Valley at Diwan Bela, named after him.
The Chiefs also known as Khans of Balakot had been from Swati tribe throughout the history.
During the War of Independence in 1857, no local chief is reported to have revolted. Instead, local chiefs helped the British Army bring down mutineers in Hoti Garrission, Mardan. In another incident, 55th Native Infantry mutineers were trying to seek refuge in Kashmir State, however, they were only able to cross the Indus in Kohistan, and were caught near Dudipatsar by local forces of the Kaghan chiefs, Kohistani people, and Gujjars. The whole gorge is now known as Purbi Nar (the gorge of Eastern People, or Bengalis). A few escaped to Kashmir, where they were handed over to the British Army for execution.
The United Arab Emirates volunteered to rebuild this town into an improved one with housing colonies, schools, hospitals, and other civic facilities. Saudi Public Assistance for Pakistan Earthquake Victims (SPAPEV), a Saudi relief organisation, also provided much assistance. Late last year the Pakistani government announced that the city would be relocated about 20 km away to a safer spot with more earthquake-proof buildings.Over 80% of the building collapsed and several schools where most of the students were buried alive. BBC NEWS – Pakistan to move quake-hit town
A Jaish-e-Mohammed militant group had a presence near the town. A 2004 United States Department of Defense document also stated that there was a JeM training camp in Balakot. However, according to analysts, the militants left Balakot after the earthquake in 2005 to avoid detection by the international aid groups arriving to provide relief.Maria Abi-Habib, After India's Strike on Pakistan, Both Sides Leave Room for De-escalation, The New York Times
In 2011, it was reported that many residents of Balakot had been rebuilding their homes and businesses in the town, despite a government ban. Ban on reconstruction violated in Balakot, The Dawn
A decade after the earthquake, the New Balakot City was still being constructed and many residents still lived in temporary earthquake-resistant shelters. Amid the locals' discontent, the Pakistani government cited the problem of acquiring the land at Bakrayal as a reason for the delay due to a dispute between the national and provincial government as well as the landowners. There are observers who also note that political patronage diverted aid away from those who need it. There are those who started rebuilding their houses in the old city. By 2006, construction of New Balakot City had resumed.
Pakistan's military, the first to announce the airstrike on 26 February morning, Quote: "Pakistan, which was the first to announce the incursion, ..." described the Indian planes as dropping their payload in an uninhabited wooded hilltop area near Balakot.
Quote: "A spokesman for Pakistan’s armed forces, Maj. Gen. Asif Ghafoor, on Tuesday posted on Twitter four images of a forested area pockmarked with small craters and debris, which he said was the site of Indian airstrikes."
India, confirming the airstrike later the same day, characterised it to be a preemptive strike directed against a terrorist training camp, and causing the deaths of more than 100 terrorists.
Analysis of open-source satellite imagery by the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensics Laboratory, Quote: "Indian fighter jets carried out strikes against targets inside undisputed Pakistani territory, but open-source evidence suggested that the strike was unsuccessful." San Francisco-based Planet Labs, Quote: "The images produced by Planet Labs Inc, a San Francisco-based private satellite operator, show at least six buildings on the madrasa site on 4 March, six days after the airstrike.
... There are no discernible holes in the roofs of buildings, no signs of scorching, blown-out walls, displaced trees around the madrasa or other signs of an aerial attack."
European Space Imaging, Quote: " ... said Managing Director Adrian Zevenbergen. '... The image captured with Worldiew-2 of the buildings in question shows no evidence of a bombing having occurred. There are no signs of scorching, no large distinguishable holes in the roofs of buildings and no signs of stress to the surrounding vegetation.' " and the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Quote: "But India’s recent air strike on a purported Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorist camp in Balakot in Pakistan on 26 February suggests that precision strike is still an art and science that requires both practice and enabling systems to achieve the intended effect. Simply buying precision munitions off the shelf is not enough." has concluded that India did not hit any targets of significance on the Jaba hilltop site in the vicinity of Balakot. Quote: " Open-source satellite imagery suggests India did not hit any targets of consequence in the airstrikes it conducted after the terrorist attack on the paramilitaries. Quote: "Analysis of open-source satellite imagery has also cast doubt on India’s claims. A report by the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab was able to geolocate the site of the attack and provide a preliminary damage assessment. It compared satellite images from the days before and after India’s strike and concluded there were only impacts in the wooded areas with no damage visible to surrounding structures."
Villagers from the area spoke of four bombs striking a nearby forest and field around 3 am, damaging a building, and injuring a local man. Journalists associated with the Associated Press visited the area on 26 February and saw craters and damaged trees. The villagers they met reported no casualties. Tensions escalate as Indian airstrike hits inside Pakistan , Associated Press A team from Al Jazeera visited the site two days after the strikes and noted "splintered pine trees and rocks" which were strewn across the four blast craters. The local hospital officials and residents asserted that they did not come across any casualty or wounded people. The reporters located the facility, a school run by Jaish-e-Mohammed, at around a kilometre to the east of one of the bomb craters, atop a steep ridge but were unable to access it. Reporters from Reuters were repeatedly denied access to the madrassa by the military citing security issues but they noted the structure (and its vicinity) to be intact from the back. The press wing of the Pakistan military had twice postponed scheduled visits to the site. However, on 29 March 2019, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) took journalists to the site where the strike took place. There were around 375 students present in the Madrasa. Journalists were allowed to interview the students. They were also allowed to take photos and record videos of the site.
On 10 April, some international journalists, who were taken to the Jaba hilltop in a tightly controlled trip after 45 days of the strike arranged by Pakistani government, discovered the largest building of the site to show no evidence of damage. Quote: "Those visiting the site on Wednesday didn't see any signs that there had been significant building work to either clear structures or erect new ones. And the vegetation didn't appear to have suffered the stress that might be expected from a missile attack." Quote: "They were given access to an Islamic school in Balakot, where Indian media say militants were killed in retaliation for an attack in Kashmir. The large building appeared to be fully intact ..." Quote: "International outlets which visited the Indian air strike site in Pakistan found no evidence of a major terrorist training camp – or of any infrastructure damage at all." Quote: "One thing is clear: India's claim that it destroyed a militant training camp and killed more than 300 extremists cannot be backed up by the evidence. More than a month after India launched airstrikes inside Pakistan in retaliation for a militant attack that killed 40 paramilitary troops in Kashmir, foreign media have been allowed to see the areas hit."
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