Split authority

This refers to the article, ‘Present split authority best for Pakistan’ (June 2) by Ayaz Amir. The writer, who seems obsessed with Ranjit Singh, has now taken it upon himself to run down the Talpurs of Sindh, branding them as ‘weak-kneed’ and unable to withstand the British onslaught. The writer is no doubt referring to the defeat of Talpur Mirs at the hands of Major-General Sir Charles Napier in 1843. Charles Napier acknowledged that the Mirs had put up a gallant resistance despite their disadvantages. The writer also fosters same reservations about the Baloch who according to him miserably failed to muster any significant resistance when confronted by the British.
However, the writer cannot ignore the fact that the Sikhs fought two wars (1846 and 1849) against the British and were trounced in both the wars. The same British army that annihilated Sikhs were earlier on disastrously defeated in the first Anglo/Afghan war when the poorly equipped Afghan tribesmen shattered the myth of British invincibility, This defeat was termed by historians and the British military itself the ‘worst military humiliation’ ever suffered by the Britain in the east prior to Japan’s invasion of Malaya and the capture of Singapore exactly a century later.
Ashfaque Ahmed Chandio
Hyderabad