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USHUR: Anything but Social Justice


Ushur, a state levy imposed by the past rulers on the subsistence farmers of Chitral until the state was merged with the North-West Province of Pakistan three decades ago. It was purely a state tax to meet its own needs without providing any social benefits in return to the people. To claim that there was a voluntary participation in the collection of Ushur does not speak to the fact. On the contrary, there was resistance to this unfair tax. Through the state functionaries who had their own source of living on the collection of Ushur, the tax was finally enforced except in the valley of Laspur. The persistent resistance of the people of Laspur was such that they were exempted from the ushur tax.

It is inconceivable that there was ever surplus agricultural yield that any family could bring to the market for sale because farmers whether they are locally called big land holders or small land holders, have always been subsistence farmers. The only difference was that those who had relatively big land holdings would have stocks that would be enough to feed their families until next harvest time. Those who had small land ownership would barely survive until mid May when the barley crops would be ready in the lower and warmer valleys of Chitral. They would rush to cut the crops and thresh it for the land owners free of payment and then borrow part of it until their own crops would be ready to return not barley but corn of the same quantity which was relatively more valuable. This barter system was called prachhar. In this kind of vicious circle of poverty, no one was able to spare any part of their yields to give voluntarily to the state.

Since it was imposed by the state and the state functionaries in each village were called malik who were chosen on the basis of their commitment to collect the highest quantity. At the harvesting time there would be a mouse and cat struggle between the poor farmers and these state functionaries. The farmers do everything possible to thresh at least part of their crops when the village malik would be away to save on ushur or in the dark night threshing the crops and hiding part of the grain while showing the remaining to the malik who would then measure and take out the ushur. The ushur system of taxation actually made poor farmers thieves, stealing and hiding the yields of their own land and of their own hard work from the state functionary in order to increase a little bit to their grain stock. It was hardly good for the maliks as well. They were basically contractors and in competition with one another would commit themselves to unrealistic quantity of grain collection from the farmers. In most cases, they could not collect the committed quantity and lost their possessions to pay to the state. Furthermore, failing to collect the committed quantity, they would add sand to the grain to enhance the weight.

The state had its grain storages (gudam) in the valleys and the collected grain would be stored in these storages and would be sold for double amount of its value back to the villagers who now having no cash would sell their animal stocks in order to buy food. There would be long line of people with applications every day in front of the office of Tahsildar who was the authority to sanction the quantity of grain. The treatment these villagers would receive from this state functionary was less than decent. The villagers being unlettered needed help not only to write applications for them but also to help them to deal with the Clark at the storage, another nightmare for them. They would get hold of students of my age to help them. I visited the storage in my valley with several villagers and I remember the Clark telling me sarcastically that I crushed the storage under my feet (tu haya gudamo druli aru). Sadly, the same Clark lost once the collected amount and had to pay the state in a strange manner at a personal cost. In short, the system engendered an unethical behaviour in otherwise simple and honest villagers. Let me illustrate this point further with another personal experience.

In February 1968, I was a class eight student. February is the beginning when the villagers’ grain stock would get very thin. This was particularly a difficult year. The local administration set particular days for different villages to come and purchase their quota of grain. One day the people of my village went, my elder brother joined them from my family. He took more than one empty begs so that he would buy the quantity of grain that would last for the next couple of months. In the evening, he returned with five kilogram of black pees, something he hated. I thought of a strategy and the next day I drafted an application saying that my exams were coming up, I would be away and my family would run out of grain in my absence. My father had passed away then and I pretended to be the elder son in the family. I went to the Tahsildar’s office to present my application, his name was Abul Rashid. I stood in front of him for about half an hour and then he looked at me and asked me what I was doing there. I presented my application and he asked me to bring recommendation from my teacher as a proof. My teacher Abdul Murad happily recommended and the Tahsidar gave approval of 100 kilogram corn for me to purchase. The storage Clark wrote a note to the malik, the contractor to supply me the approved quantity.

I went with my brother to the contractor’s village with the order. We waited for him the whole day but his family members kept us telling that he had gone to the next village. As a matter of fact, he was there all the time hiding from us and finally he came realizing that my brother and I and another man were not going to leave his home unless he showed up. I saw his pitiful condition that had lasting impact on me, a man reduced to nothingness begging a school kid that he could only give half of the quantity that he had kept for seeding. I didn’t allow my brother to argue with him and told the man to send me the money which I had already paid to the Clark. I saw on that day humanity being reduced to ashes and social justice dead. There was nothing to be proud of ushur system and there was nothing Islamic about it.


Dr. Mir Baiz Khan
Toronto