Biloch: The Broken Tribes of Derah Ghazi

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This article is an extract from PANJAB CASTES SIR DENZIL CHARLES JELF IBBETSON, K.C. S.I. Being a reprint of the chapter on The Races, Castes and Tribes of the People in the Report on the Census of the Panjab published in 1883 by the late Sir Denzil Ibbetson, KCSI Lahore : Printed by the Superintendent, Government Printing, Punjab, 1916. Indpaedia is an archive. It neither agrees nor disagrees with the contents of this article.

The Broken Tribes of Derah Ghazi

The tribes above enu merated are the only ones to be found within or immediately upon our border whieh have a regular tribal organisation. But there are many other Biloch tribes and among them some of those most numerously represented in the Panjab; whieh occupy large areas in the south-western districts of the Pro vince. They no longer hold compact territories exclusively as their own, while to great extent in the Devajat itself, and still more outside it, they have lost their peculiar language and habits and can hartlly be distinguished from the Jat population with whom they are more or less intermixed, and from whom

Dbariwal in the name of an important Jat tribe. they differ in little but race. The history of the Biloches of the Derah Ghazi lowlands is briefly sketched in the next paragraph. Their most important tribes are the Rind/ the Jatoi who still hold as a tribe, though without political organisation, a compact tract in Sindh between Shikarpur and the Indus, the Lashari/ Gopang, Gurmuni, Mastoi, Hajani, Sanjrani, and Ahmadani. These all he scattered along the edge of the Indus, intermingled with the Jats of the Kachi or low riverain tract.

Biloch tribes of Derah Ismail I have already stated that the three sons of Malik Sohrub Khan and Ghazi Khan, Dodais, founded Derah Ghazi, Derah Ismail, and D.rah Fatah Khun. The tubal name of Dodai seems to have been soon dropped, or perhaps the leaders were of a different tribe from their followers ; for the representatives and tribesmen of Ghazi Khan are locally known as Mihrani, those of Ismail Khan as Hot, and those of Fatah Khan as Kulachi. The party of Fatah Khan never seems to have attained to any importance, and was almost from the beginning subject to the Hot.

With Ghazi Khan came the Jiskani, who occupied the cis-Indus tract above Bhakkar, while with the Hots came the Korai whose name is associated with them in an old Biloch verse. The Hots and Korai are joined together ; they are equal with the Rind.The Korai do not appear to have exercised independent rule. At the zenith of their power the Hot, Mihrani, and Jiskani held sway over almost the whole of the Indus valley and of the thal between the Indus and the Chanab, from the centre of the Muzaffargarh district to the Salt-range Tract, the northern boundary of Sanghar and Leiah being the northern boundary of the Mihrani, while the Indus separated the Hot from Jiskani.

During the latter half of the 1 6th century Daud Khan, a Jiskani and the descendant of one of Ghazi Khan's followers, moved southwards and subjugatcd to himself the greater part; of the Leiah country. Akbar disipersed his tribe, but early in the 17th century the independence of the Jiskani un ler Biloch Khan was recognised, and it is from Biloch Khan that the Jisaini, Mandraui, Mamdani, Sargani, Qandrani, and Maliani, who still occupy the Bhakkar and Leiah tahsils, trace their descent. In about 1750 — 1770 A. D. the Mihrani, who sided with the Kalhoras or Sarais of Sindh in their struggle with Ahmad Shah Durrani, were driven out of Derah Ghazi by the Jiskani and fled to Leiah, where many of them are still to be found ; and a few years later the Kalhoras, exjpelled from Sindh, joined with the always turbulent Sargani to crush the Jiskani rule. About the same time the Hot were over thrown after a desperate struggle by the Gandapm- Pathans.

The Biloches of Dera Ismail are now confined to the low lands, with the exception of the Qasrani and Khetran of the southern border who have already been noticed in section 383. The upper hills are held by Pathans. The principal tribes are the Lashari, the Kulachi and the Jiskani. After them come the Rind, the Lagliari, the Jatoi, the Konu, the Chandia the Hot, the Gurmani, the Petafi, the Gashkori, and the Mihrani. Of the four last all but the Petafi seem almost confined to Derah Ismail.