Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Back in 2007, Wajid Khan was one of my juniors in school. He was studious boy, who always topped in his class. His father was Arsalan Khan – a daily wager in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas’ Mohmand Agency. He was a brilliant student who studied night and day, perhaps hoping to one day bring himself and his family out of poverty.

The praise this got Wajid from his teachers always made Arsalan proud. No doubt, he too hoped that his son could help the family escape poverty. Perhaps he could also help his mother – who had been suffering from a psychological ailment for a long time.

In 2009, Wajid was able to secure the first position in the whole district in the matriculation exams. Still, it was a tough year for him. He had to study 24/7 to fulfil the wishes of his family and teachers. Thankfully, in June 2010 the results were announced. Wajid’s academic achievements were a source of pride for the whole community. His pictures were pasted all over the agency. I still remember Wajid’s 60 year old father, smiling and showing friends and relatives his son’s pictures. He had become convinced that one day, his son would bring an end to his family’s hardships.

After the Matric results, many private colleges offered him scholarships along with a monthly stipend but he refused, and got an admission in the Peshawar Government College (PGC). He got his FSc from there, securing 815 marks out of 1100 and once again got excellent grades. Unfortunately, poverty was still an issue. So he stayed at PGC to get a Bachelors in Economics.

Wajid was a hard worker there as well, and completed his Bachelors degree with CGPA over3.0. Completing his degree in 2016, he left his studies aside, and got a job inpolio monitoring in the Mohmand Agency to support his family and his ailing mother.

Then that fateful day came — March 16. Like always, Wajid got up in the early morning. Today he was on routine duty in the volatile Safi area; the senior assigned him the duty of monitoring in the area after the polio vaccination campaign. He went there along with his colleague and was on the way back when 10 to 15 masked militant’s cordoned off his car, before eventually emptying their magazines into it.

Wajid and his unfortunate colleague’s bodies were found with their hands tied behind their backs and bullet holes in their foreheads. Wajid had been silenced in the deserted Mohmand area forever. Shortly afterwards, a picture showing the grizzly scene went viral on social media.

Providing security to the monitoring team was the responsibility of the political administration of Mohmand, clearly they didn’t fulfil that responsibility. As a consequence, the polio monitoring team was slaughtered in broad day light. According to the authorities ‘peace’ had been restored to the area a year before the incident.

That night, Arsalan Khan didn’t just bury his son – but all his hopes and dreams. Five months before this tragedy, he had also had Wajid engaged. Sadly, the militants had other plans. One of his Matriculation level teachers, Mohkim Khan, told me that he was shy, and didn’t talk much, but he had a brilliant mind which understood everything easily. This, along with his work ethic made him an exceptional student – full of potential. Mohkim added that he still could not believe that Wajid was not with us any longer, and that it was difficult to believe that such a good-natured, hard-working boy had fallen victim to a bullet.

Published in Daily Times, March 28^th 2018.