Since mention has above been made of the religious divisions of the tribesmen, I may perhaps briefly allude to their political factions, since reports from beyond the border make frequent mention of the feuds of Gar and Samil. In the fourteenth century a chief of the Bangash tribe, Ismail by name, had two sons, Gar and Samil, whose quarrels led to the tribe being split up into the two great factions which still exist under these names. Bangash or Bankash means “root-destroyer,” and this was adopted or bestowed as the tribal name by reason of the enmity aroused between the rival factions. The distinction then established still remains, and affects almost all the surrounding tribes; and since some Sunnis by religion are Samil in politics, and some Shiahs are Gar, while sometimes both cases are reversed, it may easily be realised how prolific are the causes for private quarrels and tribal feuds beyond the Bloody Border.
Of so turbulent a race what Temple said about them in 1855 might with almost equal truth have been repeated of them annually up to the present time: “They have kept up old quarrels, or picked new ones with our subjects in the plains and valleys near the frontier; they have descended from the hills and fought these battles out in our territory; they have plundered and burnt our villages and slain our subjects; they have committed minor robberies and isolated murders without number; they have often levied blackmail from our villages; they have intrigued with the disaffected everywhere and tempted our loyal subjects to rebel; and they have for ages regarded the plain as their preserve and its inhabitants as their game. When inclined for cruel sport they sally forth to rob and murder, and occasionally to take prisoners into captivity for ransom. They have fired upon our own troops, and even killed our officers in our own territories. They have given an asylum to every malcontent or proclaimed criminal who can escape from British justice. They traverse at will our territories, enter our villages, trade in our markets; but few British subjects, and no servant of the British Government, would dare to enter their country on any account whatever.”
Since the 400 miles of our borderland, comprised in the stretch from Buner on the right to Waziristan on the left, is, as computed by the Commander-in-Chief in India in 1897, inhabited by 200,000 first-rate fighting men, of the quarrelsome character above described—every man at all times ready and eager for blood-letting—it would be as well now to recount the measures which the Government of India adopts for their restraint; to state the composition and general distribution of the instruments by means of which the peace of the frontier is more or less preserved; and to note the manner in which offences committed by independent tribes beyond the border are punished.