Balochistan - the women of the vanished

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.3 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 10 June 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

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Summary

In the last two decades thousands of men have disappeared in Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest region. Activists and some of their families accuse the Pakistani authorities of enforced disappearances and extra-judicial killings. The government is fighting an insurgency in the region, but denies any involvement in the disappearances. It says some of the missing men have joined militant groups or have simply left the province.

Mutilated bodies have continued to turn up, including in mass graves.

Farhat Javed reports on Balochistan’s Women of the Vanished - the mothers and daughters left behind who are still searching for their missing loved ones.

This episode of The Documentary, comes to you from Assignment.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service.
0:06.1	Dear Baba-ja, when will you come back? Whenever I eat or drink water, I miss you.
0:17.9	Baba-jaan, where are you? I miss you so much. As she traces her finger across the paper,
0:25.8	nine-year-old Ma Asuma reads a letter she has written to her father. But she can't send it,
0:32.1	because he has been missing since she was just three months old.
0:40.2	Babajan, I am alone. Baba Jan, I am alone.
0:42.5	Without you, I cannot sleep.
0:46.1	I just want to meet you and see your face.
0:52.1	Masuma is from the latest generation of women and girls,
0:55.5	growing up in Pakistan's largest region, Balochistan,
0:58.1	searching for their missing loved ones.
1:02.1	This is assignment from the BBC World Service.
1:06.0	I'm Farhad Javid with Balochistan's Women of the Vanished. A warning, some of what you're about to hear includes upsetting details.
1:23.1	In 2021, we were told that there were some bodies in the hospital, so we should go and check if our brothers were there.
1:31.1	Saira Baloch, now 21 years old, was just 15 when she visited a morgue for the first time.
1:40.9	I still remember when we went to see those bodies.
1:44.2	When I approached the first body, its eyes were gouged out.
1:49.2	There were scars on its face.
1:51.7	Its teeth had been removed.
1:54.2	There were wounds on its chest.
1:57.5	Its hands were burned and feet badly damaged.
2:01.3	We could not recognize it.
	...

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