Osama Warraich left his mark despite his short life

PESHAWAR: Osama Ahmad Warraich served for about a year as an additional deputy commissioner in the provincial capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwwa, but he left his mark and is still remembered as an efficient officer.

His next posting was to Chitral as the deputy commissioner. He worked hard to look after the needs of the flood affectees and give comfort to the minority Kalash people in the wake of targetted killings of members of the community by the Afghanistan-based militants.

And now the young Osama Warraich is gone. The PIA plane crash on Wednesday also took his life. His wife Amna and one-year old daughter, Mahrukh, were also killed. It was a heart-wrenching tragedy.

Osama Warraich, belonging to Wazirabad in Punjab, was an officer of the Pakistan Administrative Service (PAS). He was part of the 37 Commons that qualified in 2008.Though hailing from Punjab province, he served mostly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. After stints as an assistant commissioner in Abbottabad and Swabi, he was transferred to Peshawar as an additional deputy commissioner in 2014.

Riaz Khan Mahsud, the deputy commissioner Peshawar, was highly impressed by Osama Warraich. “He was an exceptionally intelligent officer. He was also very brave,” he recalled. During the extraordinary anti-encroachment drive in Peshawar in 2015, Riaz Mahsud led the team that included Osama Warraich. At a farewell function held in honour of three officers including Osama Warraich, Mumtaz Ahmad and Shahana Shakir who had been posted out of Peshawar, Deputy Commissioner Riaz Mahsud described Warraich as his right-hand man and said his role in the action against encroachments was matchless.

The anti-encroachment campaign helped recover state-owned land worth billions of rupees from encroachers and land mafia.  It was a difficult task as the encroachers were influential people, but the young Peshawar district administration team accomplished it with good results.

At the same farewell function, Osama Warraich remarked that his misconceptions about Peshawar vanished when he served in the city. “I am now in a position to tell my friends in Punjab that Peshawar is a wonderful place and its residents are very supportive and helpful,” he had observed.

Before his posting in Peshawar, Osama Warraich had undertaken an anti-encroachment drive in Abbottabad, where land is precious and properties are in high demand.

“Osama wasn’t a Pakhtun, but he had adopted the Pakhtun ways,” remarked Riaz Mahsud while sharing his thoughts with The News about the late civil servant. “Osama spoke broken Pashto, but was well aware of Pakhtun traditions,” he added.

According to Riaz Mahsud, Osama Warraich’s mother wanted him to become a deputy commissioner. He said her wish was finally fulfilled as Osama Warraich became the first officer in his batch to become a deputy commissioner. However, her son’s life was short and her happiness was brief.

Osama Warraich’s parents live in Islamabad and it appears he was flying to the federal capital along with his wife and daughters to be with his old mother and father, who is a retired professor from National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST). 

Osama Warraich’s brother is serving in the Foreign Office and is presently posted in the US. His sister is married and is also living in the US. Waiting to receive the bodies of Osama Warraich, his wife and daughter at the Ayub Teaching Hospital in Abbottabad and take them to Islamabad, Riaz Mahsud said the tragedy had shocked him and many others who knew him. Osama Warraich had a short life, but he impressed all those who came into contact with him.