Mangal (Pashtun tribe)

The Mangal (Pashto: منگل‎) are a Pashtun tribe, residing in Southeastern Paktia and adjacent Khost provinces of Afghanistan And also in a small village of Qematay Mangal, district Pathan, Afghanistan and in a small village of Tari Mangal, district Kurram, Pakistan. The Mangals descent from Karlani Pashtun lineage, which is much smaller compared to other Pashtun clans like Durrani and Ghilzai.

Mangals are known for their bravery and independent nature, they have resisted the taliban and other infiltrators. Majority of Mangals are spread across Afghanistan who among other Afghans are attached to professions such as politicians, military commanders, teachers and scholars specializing in Pashto literature. The Mangal leaders are most recognized for settling tribal disputes and have founded unwritten code known as (nerkh) which the Pashtun tribes still use as a tool to resolve conflict among each other. A small number of Mangals residing in the present day lakki marwat District around 1500 AD along with Honi tribe. Most of these Mangals live as independent in lakki marwat(kpk) and in Kurma Pakistan which borders the Mangal province of Paktia in Afghanistan.

The Mangal tribal militia was one of the various militias assisted Mohammad Nader Khan to topple the Tajik King, Habibullah Kalakani. Consequently, Nadir Khan owed much to the tribes of Paktia, these tribal leaders were granted vast war booty and power by the new administration. In fact, the entire greater Loya Paktia region was exempt from mandatory military service, which the rest of the nation (regardless of ethnicity, region, or family) endured.

The Mangal tribal militia was deployed in Northern Afghanistan shortly before Nadir Khan's assassination to oust an Uzbek Muslim resistance fighter, Ibrahimbeg Laqqai, who was using ethnic kin support in Northern Afghanistan against Soviets in his homeland across the Oxus river. Laqqai had been successfully battling Soviet troops, who had taken over his homeland of modern-day Uzbekistan, in what is now known as the Basmachi Movement. During Kalakani's short rule as king, Laqqai was given support in the Northern Tajik and Uzbek communities and thus he recruited locals to fight across the river against the Soviets. Mohammad Nader Khan worried by this, summoned the Mangal tribe, amongst others, armed them with Soviet-supplied weaponry and motivated them by promises of war booty, to being dispatched to the north. Within a few months, with Soviet support and systematic terror against Tajik and Uzbek locals, the Basmachi Movement were brutally crushed in Afghanistan and eventually in Central Asia and driven him back across the Amu river, where Ibrahimbeg Laqqai was subsequently captured and hanged by the Soviets.

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