Perception of Race and Skin Color in Pakistan

[Marwat Khan Lodhi]

Just because someone speaks pushto and resides in pukhtoon areas does not make him a pukhtoon, a black American lives in America, speaks English but that doesn't make him white does it?.

What you saw is not necessarily a genuine article.

Exactly. Among pashto speakers , there are "true pashtuns", the land owners who belong to one of the 60 tribe of pashtuns, and karigars (jollaha, chamar, kumhar, hajam etc), mullahs, damans etc who came from hindostani regions and were hired for their services. As pashtuns considered these profession as below their status. According some estimates these "non-tribal" pashtuns make up 30-40% population of the KP. So we pashtuns also have caste system, but different from punjab for we took these artisans as our "vassals". They are generally of darker skin tone.