Pashtun Culture Day marked with traditional music and dance

To mark their annual culture day, the Pashtun community in Karachi on Thursday held rallies, organised an event at the Arts Council of Pakistan (ACP) and staged a folk dance at Sea View.

Pashtun Culture Day has been celebrated on September 23 every year since 2014. The day was designated for promoting the Pashtun culture during a meeting of the Afghan Forum, a cross-border peace initiative, in Peshawar that year.

Since then, gatherings are held in various cities, particularly Peshawar, Quetta, Islamabad, and Karachi, to mark the day on September 23.

The Awami National Party and its student body, the Pashtun Students Federation, jointly organised an event at the ACP where the party’s leaders, including provincial president Shahi Syed, secretary general Younas Buneri, Pakistan Peoples Party MNA Qadir Khan Mandokhel, and senior journalists Ajmal Khattak Kashar and Jamshed Bukhari spoke about the Pashtun culture.

They said the objective of celebrating Pashtun Culture Day was to make the students aware of the rich Pashtun culture and traditions, and promote unity. Gulzar Alam, prominent Pashto singer, also performed at the event.

“The Pashtuns are peace loving people and our wrong image is being shown to the world,” Syed said as he addressed the event. “The current situation in the region is very critical. At this time, attitudes of peace, love, affection and tolerance are urgently needed.”

Buneri stressed how it was necessary to show the world that the Pashtuns were peaceful people with a vibrant culture and traditions.

Attanr, a Pashtun community dance, was also performed at the event in which many dancers were clad in traditional Pashtun dresses. Moving in circles to the drumbeat, the dancers picked up speed whirling at an ever-increasing pace till the end.