How Gwadar was Purchased from Oman? Separating Myth from Reality.
How did Pakistan reacquire the control of Gwadar?
Dear Readers,
The BYC’s ongoing sit-in protests in Gwadar have rekindled a discussion of the ownership of Gwadar.
Gwadar has always been a hot issue in the debate of Balochistan and its entire grievance narrative. Those who claim that Balochistan’s grievances are genuine use Gwadar as an example. Those who deny the grievance narrative of Balochistan question the historical ownership of Gwadar.
The naysayers propagate a narrative that Gwadar was bought by the State of Pakistan from the Sultanate of Oman and, therefore, Balochistan can’t establish its claim on the port city when it comes to deciding the control over revenues of Gwadar port in the future to come.
There have been many posts on social media with false claims about how Gwadar was acquired from Oman and how Oman took control of Gwadar in the first place.
Let’s set the record straight using excerpts from two authentic books on this topic:
1) How did Oman take control of Gwadar?
Gwatar Bay to Sir Creek: The Golden Coast of Pakistan — History and Memoirs, is authored by retired Vice Admiral Iftikhar Ahmed Rao of the Pakistan Navy. This book describes in detail how Gwadar was handed over by the Kalat State — the forerunner of current-day Balochistan — in 1783 to Oman.
As per this book, Khan of Kalat, the ruler of Kalat state, took control of Gwadar in 1778. In 1783, an Omani prince Sultan bin Ahmad sailed to Gwadar after a failed coup against his father. Noori Naseer Khan, then Khan of Kalat, allotted Bin Ahmad control of Gwadar and a half share of Gwadar’s revenue as maintenance allowance. Bin Ahmad became sultan of Oman in 1792 but did not return Gwadar to Kalat State.
“From Memory” is the title of the autobiography of Feroz Khan Noon which was published in 1966. Feroz Khan Noon (1893-1970) served as the 7th Prime Minister of Pakistan from 1957-58.
Feroz Khan Noon writes on page 298 of the book that in 1783 a prince of Muscat fled to Gwadar and was given refuge by Khan of Kalat, who was the King of the area comprising Gwadar. To facilitate the Prince to arrange for his maintenance, the Khan of Kalat allowed the prince a revenue collection of 84 Tunaks (Rupees) per year from Gwadar. Later on, the same prince became the King of Oman but didn’t return Gwadar to Kalat.
2) Kalat claimed control of Gwadar multiple times before partition:
Feroz Khan Noon writes in his book that in 1839 British subjugated the Kalat state and brought it under their rule. In 1861, the then Khan of Kalat demanded that Oman return Gwadar to Kalat State but the British Raj didn’t help Kalat in this regard because Oman was a protectorate of the British Empire.
Vice Admiral Rao writes that In 1903, the then Khan of Kalat officially for the first time laid claim to Gwadar via the British Indian government.
3) Pakistan’s claim on Gwadar:
Fast forward to 1947. Oman retained control of Gwadar after the Partition of the Subcontinent. The following year Pakistan started efforts to regain control of Gwadar.
According to Rao, Pakistan’s case for acquiring Gwadar was based on the plea that the port town had historically been part of Kalat State, which was now part of Pakistan.
During negotiations with Oman via the British government, Prime Minister Noon adopted the following legal plea: “Gwadar was a Jagir, an area of a state, given to a person so he may collect state taxes due from the area and use them for maintenance. In such a case ownership could not be transferred to a sovereign power. All Jagirs given by the British government were cancelled and we could have done the same with Gwadar but never mentioned this point in negotiations.”
4) Purchase of Gwadar in 1958:
Rao terms Sultan Said bin Taimur, then ruler of Oman, a hard bargainer who delayed the transfer process as long as he could to attain maximum concessions. The sultan refused to directly negotiate with Pakistan and, therefore, the British government acted as an intermediary.
In September 1958, Pakistan finally bought back Gwadar from Oman. Pakistan was able to reclaim the 2,400 square miles of territory of Gwadar in return for a payment.
According to the 14-point agreement of transfer — shared by tRao in his book — Pakistan paid Oman three million pounds for the loss of revenue. This deal was carefully crafted so that the Sultan of Oman could avoid technically ‘selling’ Gwadar.
Moreover, Pakistan also agreed to pay 10 percent of profits to Oman for 25 years on oil discovered from Gwadar at any time in the future. This reveals the very important fact that Oman still has a technical stake in Gwadar’s natural wealth.
Bottom Line
Based on the two aforementioned books and the records of the India Office of the British Library:
1) Gwadar was a historical part of the Baloch state of Kalat. Therefore, the modern-day province of Balochistan — the forerunner of the Kalat state — has a legitimate and just claim on this piece of coastal land within the territory of Pakistan.
2) Gwadar was reacquired by Pakistan using the Kalat’s historical ownership claim of Gwadar, without which Gwadar could not have been reacquired.
Best Regards,
Adnan Aamir