introductionIndeed, more than likely it was the Mughals who disparagingly summed
up pushtunwali as zar, zan wa zamin – gold, women and land. Pushtuns
themselves define pushtunwali in more positive terms, all of which are
based on the principle of upholding personal and tribal honour. Tura is
courage, especially in battle; nang is the defence of personal honour, but
also of the weak and vulnerable; while ‘izzat is personal honour and status.
Hospitality, melmastia, is another key value in Pushtun society since this
is another means of gaining honour. The custom of nanawatai, sanctuary,
obliges individuals to shelter and defend anyone who seeks protection and
asylum, even if they are political fugitives, criminals or personal enemies.
Ghairat, another key term, is a particularly difficult concept to define and
even Pushtuns have trouble explaining it. The term involves the proactive,
jealous guarding of qaum honour, in particular the adult male’s role as
‘gatekeepers’ for the women. Ghairat is also closely linked to the concept
of namus, the upholding of women’s virtue and modesty. 13 Other values of
pushtunwali include badal, the obligation of reciprocity, in particular related
to revenge. However, for Pushtuns the heart of pushtunwali is not a list of
terms or things one does, or does not do, but a way of life, for pushtunwali
means doing, or being Pushtu.
British colonial administrators dealt mainly with the tribal, mountain-
dwelling Pushtuns of the Afghan frontier where pushtunwali was strongly
embedded and there was a tendency to regard this cultural practice as univer-
sal as well as unique to Pushtun society. Many urbanized Pushtuns do not
uphold pushtunwali and many dislike the European tendency to focus on the
negative aspects of badal, since it gives the impression that Pushtun society
is innately lawless and ‘red in tooth and claw’. 14 Some Pushtun academics
even dismiss much of pushtunwali as a romantic construct of nineteenth-
and early twentieth-century ethnology on the one hand, and the product of
state-sponsored ethnocentric nationalism on the other.
Many of the features of pushtunwali are far from unique and are found
in various degrees among other ethnolinguistic groups in Afghanistan.
Uzbeks have a customary law, the Ya s a, drawn up by Chinggis Khan in the
thirteenth century. Hazaras, Nuristanis, Turkmans and Kazakhs too have
their own customary law. As for the culture of reciprocal vengeance, this is
mainly enforced among nomadic, rural and mountain-dwelling Pushtuns,
and the idea of reciprocity for harm done is equally important among
Uzbeks, Hazaras, Nuristanis and Baluch. While Western authors focus on
the negative aspects of badal it is important to note that many Pushtuns,
and other citizens of Afghanistan, have worked tirelessly to resolve disputes
and vendettas by traditional conflict-resolution mechanisms.