Decades of sending sons to the military provided employment and helped boost literacy rates in Chakwal, but at a heartbreaking cost.

As Pakistan fights against the Taliban across the northwest tribal belt, the military is swelling its ranks with young men who come from Punjab districts like Chakwal and risk their lives to feed their families.

"At least one person of each family in a population of one million is still serving in the army," said Tariq Bakhsi, Chakwal's administrative chief.

The military graves dotted over the 6,524-square-kilometre (4,054-square-mile) region are a testament to the risks the soldiers sign up for, but Chakwal has little else to offer its young men.

Across the vast arid fields, farmers try to eke out a living from wheat, mustard seeds and peanut crops, but are only just able to feed their families.

Ironically, footsoldiers in militant groups often enlist for similar reasons -- lack of education and employment opportunities that make a life of militancy their only realistic chance of securing a monthly stipend.

Unemployment is 12 percent in Chakwal -- more than double the national average of 5.2 percent, according to official statistics.

Soldiers get a starting salary of 8,000 rupees (95 dollars) a month, with salaries rising throughout their careers.

"Industry could have been established but there was no road network in the past and insufficient raw material," said Bakhsi.

"Due to the unavailability of a water source, we can't have an irrigation system. There is only one major river, Jhelum, in the area, which is separated by the huge and solid salt range and a water channel is impossible."

With most residents unable to pay for post-secondary education for their children, the military is seen as the best option.

"With the army recruiting hundreds of young men every year, the unemployment rate of the district has been reduced... and the literacy rate shot up to 72 percent," said Bakhsi.

Lying about 100 kilometres (62 miles) southwest of Islamabad, Chakwal is known as the martial district of the country. The area was a favourite infantry recruitment centre for British colonial rulers.

The first Victoria Cross on the sub-continent was awarded to Chakwal's Khudadad Khan in 1914. Since then, the area has provided footsoldiers for three wars against India and now the war on Islamist extremism.

The army says that 2,273 military personnel have been killed battling insurgents since 2001, while about 6,500 troops have been injured.

Munawar Noor was the mother of one such recruit.

Her husband died when her only son, Safdar Hussein, was just a baby and with no financial support she struggled to provide for him. So when he was 19, Hussein left Chakwal's Dhedwal village and joined the military.

Hussein served for 13 years and helped provide his mother with a regular income, sending home 5,000 rupees (60 dollars) every month so she was finally able to pull herself out of poverty.

But on August 15, he was killed instantly in a car-bomb attack on a military checkpost in the northwestern Swat valley.

The 60-year-old visits his grave daily. She still keeps his clothes, shoes, shaving kit and military effects close.

Relatives are entitled to compensation dependent on rank, but that is little consolation for the grieving mother.

"My son was lucky. He served his mother, motherland and died a brave man. I am unlucky -- I spent my youth grooming him and when the time came to enjoy his life in its prime, he left me alone to wait for my death," she told AFP.

Talagang, one of the major towns in the district, is also in mourning.

Walls are plastered with photos of Havildar Isthzar Hussein, who led a commando operation to end a siege by Taliban militants of army headquarters in Rawalpindi last October.

Hussein served in the Special Services Group unit when he volunteered to lead the rescue operation at the headquarters, where militants had taken around 40 people hostage during an assault that saw another 15 people killed.

Hussein was among the dead.

"He called me in the night of October 10, hours before the operation and prohibited me to call his cell phone," said his 23-year-old widow, Khalida Nasreen.

"The next day I received his dead body and all my happiness went with him," she added.

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