Seeing criminals in chains is a normal sight, but can you imagine a tree heavily chained? Yes, there is a banyan tree in Landi Kotal, a historic town at the western end of the Khyber Pass in present-day Pakistan, where it is actually chained. Not only this, the heavy chains hold the tree to the ground, while a board attached to it carries the extraordinary words:“I am under arrest.”But behind the unique sight is an age-old story that has survived for more than a century, which is part local history and part colonial-era anecdote.What’s the tale?As per story, the incident took place in 1898. The area was under British rule in India and that time the officer named James Squid, reportedly intoxicated, said that the tree was moving towards him. He allegedly ordered a mess sergeant to arrest it and have it chained so that it could not escape.The story has been in Pakistani and international media for yearsA report citing former Khyber Rifles mess secretary Captain Nasir Farooq said the officer believed the tree was moving and that it might even “run away” towards Peshawar. The plaque on the tree similarly recounts the tale of an intoxicated British officer ordering the tree to be arrested.Where is Landi Kotal?
Chained tree at Landi Kotal (Instagram)
It’s the time before Pakistan did not exist as an independent country. The region formed part of British India. Landi Kotal occupied an exceptionally strategic position at the western end of the Khyber Pass. The pass was one of the most important routes between the Indian subcontinent and Afghanistan. The National Army Museum describes Landi Kotal as a British post at the western mouth of the Khyber Pass.The timing of the tree story is particularly striking. The Khyber region had witnessed serious unrest in 1897, when Afridi tribesmen attacked British posts, including Landi Kotal. The British subsequently reinforced their position in the area. By 1899, the Khyber Rifles were stationed at Landi Kotal and other posts in the pass.For local residents, the story has sometimes been interpreted as a miniature illustration of colonial authority: an official could supposedly point at an immobile tree and declare it under arrest, and the order would be carried out.The tree could not protest, of course
The tree is still heavily chained
The tree could not protest or flee. So the chains remained.At first glance, it looks like a joke: an intoxicated officer thinking the tree is moving. But the joke becomes darker when placed in the context of a heavily militarised frontier. And now the tree has outlived the authority that supposedly imprisoned it.Today, the chains are perhaps more powerful as a historical curiosity than as evidence of exactly what happened in 1898. The British Empire is gone, the political map of South Asia has changed, and the Khyber Pass has witnessed generations of upheaval.It feels strange to see the wooden sign “I am under arrest” today.A tree cannot be arrested. And clearly it cannot run away anywhere or understand an order issued by a drunken officer. Yet, more than a century later, it still stands in chains often reminding the world of a period when the whole world was ‘chained’ by one power.