Tourism involves traveling for pleasure and making use of commercial services. Cultural tourism accounts for 37% of global tourism and focuses on immersing travelers in local rituals, routines, and unique experiences. For destinations, cultural tourism encourages communities to embrace their culture, promotes what distinguishes them, and provides opportunities for cultural exchange between locals and visitors. Developing cultural tourism programs can boost economic growth while encouraging destinations to celebrate their distinguishing characteristics.

1. CULTURAL TOURISM
Tourism, the act and process of spending time away from home in pursuit of
recreation, relaxation, and pleasure, while making use of the commercial provision
of services. As such, tourism is a product of modern social arrangements,
beginning in western Europe in the 17th century, although it has antecedents in
Classical antiquity. It is distinguished from exploration in that tourists follow a
“beaten path,” benefit from established systems of provision, and, as befits
pleasure-seekers, are generally insulated from difficulty, danger, and
embarrassment. Tourism, however, overlaps with other activities, interests, and
processes, including, for example, pilgrimage. This gives rise to shared categories,
such as “business tourism,” “sports tourism,” and “medical tourism” (international
travel undertaken for the purpose of receiving medical care).

2. CULTURAL TOURISM
Pashtun, also spelled Pushtun or Pakhtun, Hindustani Pathan, Persian Afghan, Pashto-
speaking people residing primarily in the region that lies between the Hindu Kush in
northeastern Afghanistan and the northern stretch of the Indus River in Pakistan. They
constitute the majority of the population of Afghanistan and bore the exclusive name of
Afghan before that name came to denote any native of the present land area of
Afghanistan.

3. CULTURAL TOURISM
• The origins of the Pashtun are unclear. Pashtun tradition asserts that they are
descended from Afghana, grandson of King Saul of Israel, though most scholars
believe it more likely that they arose from an intermingling of ancient Aryans from
the north or west with subsequent invaders. Several Pashtun tribes are known to
have moved from Afghanistan to Pakistan between the 13th and 16th centuries.
Each tribe, consisting of kinsmen who trace descent in the male bloodline from a
common tribal ancestor, is divided into clans, subclans, and patriarchal families.
Tribal genealogies establish rights of succession and inheritance and the right to use
tribal lands and to speak in tribal council. Disputes over property, women, and
personal injury often result in blood feuds between families and whole clans; these
may be inherited unless settled by the intervention of clan chiefs or by tribal council.

4. CULTURAL TOURISM
• Most Pashtun are sedentary farmers, combining cultivation with animal husbandry.
Some are migratory herders and caravaners. Many Pashtun serve in the military.
Smaller numbers hold political posts.
• There were estimated to be about 11 million Pashtun in Afghanistan and 25 million
in Pakistan in the early 21st century. They comprise about 60 tribes of varying size
and importance, each of which occupies a particular territory. In Afghanistan, where
the Pashtun are the predominant ethnic group, the main tribes—or, more
accurately, federations of tribes—are the Durrānī south of Kabul and the Ghilzay
east of Kabul.

5. CULTURAL TOURISM
• In Pakistan the Pashtun predominate north of Quetta between the Sulaiman Range
and the Indus River. In the hill areas the main tribes are, from south to north, the
Kākaṛ, Shērāni, and Ustarāna south of the Gumal River; the Maḥsūd, Darwēsh Khēl,
Wazīrī, and Biṭanī between the Gumal River and Thal; the Tūrī, Bangash, Ōrakzay,
Afrīdī, and Shinwārī from Thal to the Khyber Pass; and the Mahmand, Utmān Khēl,
Tarklānī, and Yūsufzay north and northeast of the Khyber.
• The settled areas include lowland tribes subject to direct administration by the
provincial government. The main tribes there are, from south to north, the Banūchī
and Khaṭak from the Kurram River to Nowshera, and the Khalīl and Mandāṇ in the
Vale of Peshawar. The cities of Kandahār, Jalālābād, and Lashkar Gāh in Afghanistan
and Peshawar and Quetta in Pakistan are important centres of Pashtun culture.

6. CULTURAL TOURISM
• Dir, town, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Pakistan. The town lies just north of the
Dir River, an affluent of the Panjkora, and is connected by road with Malakand, 70
miles (110 km) south. Mullā Ilyās, a 17th-century holy man, is said to have been the
founder. Cottage industries include the making of clothing and footwear. There is
also a wood-processing plant.
• The surrounding region, a former princely state of the Akhund Khel royal house, is
drained by the Panjkora and its affluents. The upper portion of the Panjkora Valley
as far as its confluence with the Dir River is called Panjkora Kohistan. The Dir Valley
is also known as Kashkar. The population is mainly confined to the Panjkora and its
fertile lateral valleys, which produce abundant fruit. Forests on the mountain slopes
yield timber, the main source of income. Yusufzay Pashtun are the predominant
ethnic group. Pop. (1998) 24,776.

7. CULTURAL TOURISM
• In ancient times, the state of Gandhara occupied the Vale of Peshawar and adjoining areas. This kingdom was important because of
its strategic location at the eastern end of the Khyber Pass. Gandhara was annexed by the Persian Achaemenian dynasty in the early
6th century BCE and remained a Persian satrapy until 327 BCE. The region then passed successively under Greek, Indian, Indo-
Bactrian, Sakan, Parthian, and Kushan rule.
• Muslim rule was first brought to the region by a former Turkish slave-soldier (mamlūk) named Sebüktigin, who gained control of
Peshawar in 988 CE. His son, Maḥmūd of Ghazna, invaded northern India several times between 1001 and 1027 and brought a large
area of the present-day province into the boundaries of the Ghaznavid dynasty. Beginning in the late 12th century, the region was
held successively by the Ghūrid sultanate, by various Muslim Afghan dynasties, and then by the Mughal dynasty. After the invasion
of the Iranian ruler Nādir Shah in 1738, the territory remained under the loose control of the Afghan Durrānī clan. Beginning about
1818, invading Sikhs from the Punjab region of India increasingly secured control of the frontier territory until the coming of the
British in 1849.
• The northwestern frontier areas were annexed to India by the British after the Second Sikh War (1848–49). The territories thenceforth
formed a part of the Punjab until the province, then known as North-West Frontier Province, was created in 1901. After Pakistan
attained independence in 1947, the region continued to exist as a separate Pakistani province. However, the inhabitants of the tribal
territories, the westernmost area along the Afghanistan border, were not made subject to the Pakistani legal code. During the 1980s
the province was inundated by Afghan refugees seeking asylum from the Soviet occupation of their country. The tribal areas were
also a major staging area for mujahideen fighters entering Afghanistan (see Afghan War). Following the collapse of the Taliban
regime in Afghanistan in 2001, the tribal areas became a refuge for Taliban and mujahideen fighters.
• In 2010 the name of the province was officially changed to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Later that year, unusually heavy monsoon rains
forced the Indus River into extraordinary floods. The inundation devastated swaths of Pakistani land, including Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Officials there, unprepared to deal with such flooding with so little notice, were overwhelmed by the destruction and human costs
wrought by the floodwaters. By mid-August, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa accounted for about two-thirds of all reported flood-related
deaths.

8. CULTURAL TOURISM
• The World Tourism Organisation tells us that cultural tourism accounts for 37% of
global tourism, and furthermore affirms that it will continue to grow 15% each year.
With all of this market interest, destinations should leverage what makes their
societies unique and invest in developing cultural tourism programs.
• What is Cultural Tourism?
• Cultural tourism allows travelers to be immersed in local rituals and routines, taking
away not only pretty photos but also shared memories of unique experiences. For
destinations, it encourages local communities to embrace their culture and boosts
economic growth. Developing culturally geared tourism programs encourages
destinations to celebrate and promote what distinguishes their communities, and in
doing so, provides the opportunity for authentic cultural exchange between locals
and visitors.

9. CULTURAL TOURISM
• The way ahead
• Formation of Village Tourism Groups
• Provision of camping Pods
• Training to guides on dos and donts
• The activities of traditional celeberations of marriages
• Music and folk lore
• Local cuisines
• Health hygiene
• Winter and autumn
• Spring and summer
• Other activities as adventure , eco friendly trekking, mountaineering, skiing etc