Ilam Khan earned his Master’s in Political Science and International Relations at the International Islamic University Islamabad. He is now pursuing his PhD at the Center for International Peace and Stability (CIPS), National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST). Currently he is a Research Fellow in the department of Political Science and Legal Studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA. He is conducting ethnographic research of the post-conflict environment in Swat, a district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province of Pakistan. His areas of interest are the indigenous approach to conflict management, resolution and rehabilitation; ethnographic and participatory research; nationalism and ethnicity; restorative justice; Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan.