INDIA PAKISTAN COMMUNISM NEGATIVES PHOTOS Malik Fazal Elahi Qurban Punjab 1946

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Seller: memorabilia111 ✉️ (808) 100%, Location: Ann Arbor, Michigan, US, Ships to: US & many other countries, Item: 176278959892 INDIA PAKISTAN COMMUNISM NEGATIVES PHOTOS Malik Fazal Elahi Qurban Punjab 1946. TWO VERY RARE 4X5 INCH NEGATIVES OF  Malik Fazal Elahi Qurban WHO FOUNDED THE COMMUNIST PARTY IN PAKISTAN AND WAS MEMBER OF SEVERAL ORGANIZATIONS IN INDIA, INCLUDES PAPER DESCRIPTION OF NEGATIVES AS WELL AS ORIGINAL ENVELOPE FROM 1946. The Pakistan Communist Party was a short-lived splinter-group of the Communist Party of India, existing for three weeks in the summer of 1947. The party was founded by Teja Singh Swatantar and Fazal Elahi Qurban. The party had a provisional politburo consisting of Swatantar, Qurban and Dutt. On one hand, the PCP split represented dissatisfaction with the shift of the party line on the national question. In 1942 CPI had, in response to the demand for Pakistan, formulated a position which supported the notion of self-determination of nationalities. By 1947 this line had been reverted and the Muslim demand for Pakistan was now branded as a reactionary movement by CPI. Swatantar and Qurban argued towards the CPI leadership to retain support for self-determination of nationalities.The PCP was built on this position. The founders of PCP were also opposed to the new CPI line on Kashmir. On the other hand, the launch of PCP was not only about disagreements on the issue of Pakistan and Muslim national self-determination. It also represented a revolt of the old Kirti-Ghadar revolutionaries against the CPI party hierarchy. On 22 June two central CPI leaders (Ajoy Ghosh and B.T. Ranadive) had arrived in Punjab, supposedly to depose Swatantar as Provincial Party Secretary. A few weeks later, on 16 July 1947 the foundation of PCP was declared in a letter sent out to 40 communist parties around the world[The PCP split severely affected the CPI in Punjab at the time. The CPI leadership reacted strongly to the formation of PCP.[3] On 18 July 1947 a letter was sent to all Party District Committees in Punjab, instructing them to denounce the PCP.[2] Ghosh himself visited the western parts of Punjab, trying to dissuade local party branches from siding with PCP.[2] Nevertheless, it was understood that more than half of the 2,293 CPI members in Punjab were supportive of the PCP The PCP was mainly based in western Punjab.[2] PCP appealed to CPI branches in the North-West Frontier Province, Sindh and Baluchistan to join the new party. In Sindh the group around Qadir Baksh Nizamani supported the PCP. Nevertheless, by the time PCP was formed Punjab was engulfed by communal violence in the days before the Partition of India.[3] As riots raged, most Sikh and Hindu communist cadres in the western districts of Punjab left for India. This exodus left the communist movement on the verge of extinction in the lands that would soon form West Pakistan. PCP, whose leadership was predominately Sikh, quickly became defunct.
The Pakistan Communist Party was a short-lived splinter-group of the Communist Party of India, existing for three weeks in the summer of 1947.[1] The party was founded by Teja Singh Swatantar and Fazal Elahi Qurban.[1] The party had a provisional politburo consisting of Swatantar, Qurban and Dutt.[2] On one hand, the PCP split represented dissatisfaction with the shift of the party line on the national question. In 1942 CPI had, in response to the demand for Pakistan, formulated a position which supported the notion of self-determination of nationalities. By 1947 this line had been reverted and the Muslim demand for Pakistan was now branded as a reactionary movement by CPI. Swatantar and Qurban argued towards the CPI leadership to retain support for self-determination of nationalities.[3] The PCP was built on this position.[3] The founders of PCP were also opposed to the new CPI line on Kashmir.[2] On the other hand, the launch of PCP was not only about disagreements on the issue of Pakistan and Muslim national self-determination. It also represented a revolt of the old Kirti-Ghadar revolutionaries against the CPI party hierarchy. On 22 June two central CPI leaders (Ajoy Ghosh and B.T. Ranadive) had arrived in Punjab, supposedly to depose Swatantar as Provincial Party Secretary. A few weeks later, on 16 July 1947 the foundation of PCP was declared in a letter sent out to 40 communist parties around the world.[2] The PCP split severely affected the CPI in Punjab at the time.[2] The CPI leadership reacted strongly to the formation of PCP.[3] On 18 July 1947 a letter was sent to all Party District Committees in Punjab, instructing them to denounce the PCP.[2] Ghosh himself visited the western parts of Punjab, trying to dissuade local party branches from siding with PCP.[2] Nevertheless, it was understood that more than half of the 2,293 CPI members in Punjab were supportive of the PCP.[2] The PCP was mainly based in western Punjab.[2] PCP appealed to CPI branches in the North-West Frontier Province, Sindh and Baluchistan to join the new party.[2] In Sindh the group around Qadir Baksh Nizamani supported the PCP.[3] Nevertheless, by the time PCP was formed Punjab was engulfed by communal violence in the days before the Partition of India.[3] As riots raged, most Sikh and Hindu communist cadres in the western districts of Punjab left for India.[3] This exodus left the communist movement on the verge of extinction in the lands that would soon form West Pakistan.[3] PCP, whose leadership was predominately Sikh, quickly became defunct.[2] The Communist Party of Pakistan (CPP) was formally established in the Second Congress of the Communist Party of India (CPI) held in February-March 1948 in Calcutta It was in line with the decision taken in the central committee of the party in July 1947 when the policy switch took place between losing P.C. Joshi group and the rising B.T. Ranadive group in the party. Out of about 800 delegates to the Congress only three members represented the areas now forming Pakistan. These included Prof. Eric Cyprian from Punjab, Muhammad Hussain Ata from NWFP (now KPK), and Jamaluddin Bukhari from Sindh. Two other nominated delegates from Punjab, Mirza Muhammad Ibrahim and C.R. Aslam couldn’t attend the Congress as they were reportedly caught in the last moment organising a railway workers’ strike in Lahore. Moreover, Kanwar Moni Singh, Khokha Roy and Kalpana Dutt (69) attended the Congress together with about thirty other delegates representing party organisation in the then East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). Because of the partition and resulting transfer of population, the communist organisation in the areas of the newly established Pakistan had suffered a major set-back. In the wake of drawing arbitrary lines of partition of Bengal and Punjab provinces, cutting each into Pakistani and Indian parts, worst communal riots among Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs erupted. In these communal riots, massive killing, arson, torching of homes and commercial properties, and abduction and rape of women on unprecedented scale engulfed particularly Punjab, Bihar, and Bengal. An estimated number of about one and half million were killed, 75,000 women were raped, and about 15 million people were uprooted and crossed the border on either side to save their lives and honour. Most of the prominent CPI leaders and communist workers from Pakistani areas belonged to Hindu and Sikh religion. All of them from Punjab and NWFP barring a few exceptions in Sindh migrated to India, leaving behind a severely fractured and almost dysfunctional party in Pakistan. Western Punjab and eastern Bengal were engulfed in the flames of worst communal riots never witnessed before. The situation was equally gruesome in the Indian parts of the eastern Punjab and western Bengal. The CPI leadership, however, made efforts to reorganize the party structure with the help of local Muslim members in Pakistan including a few veterans of 1920s e.g. Firozuddin Mansoor, Fazal Elahi Qurban and Amir Hyder Khan. These local communists were gradually joined by those Muslim comrades who were immigrating into the new country from the areas now forming India. The party organization was still a part of CPI, with its headquarters in Bombay. Ajoy Kumar Ghosh had been made in-charge of the activities of the Pakistani communists. He visited Lahore in October 1947 and re-organised the party structure with the remaining Muslim and a few Christian members of the party who opted to live in Pakistan. Punjab Provincial Committee was formed with Mirza Muhammad Ibrahim (secretary), Chaudhry Rehmatullah (C.R.) Aslam, Firozuddin Mansoor, and Eric Cyprian as members. Whereas Jamaluddin Bukhari was made secretary in Sindh and Muhammad Hussain Ata held the position of secretary in NWFP. The Lahore District Committee had Shamim Ashraf Malik (Secretary), Abdullah Malik, Ghulam Muhammad, Prof Muhammad Safdar, and Abdul Ghafoor as members. Rawalpindi District Committee had Mirza Aziz (Secretary), Dada Amir Hyder, and Soofi Allah Ditta as members. Ajoy Kumar Ghosh was followed by Sajjad Zaheer visiting Pakistan in November 1947 to mobilize party members for the Calcutta Congress. He came to Lahore staying at 114, McLeod Road, the CPI headquarter in Lahore. He extensively toured other parts of Punjab, NWFP, Sindh and Karachi to do his spade work for the Party Congress and held organizational meetings. He also organised a conference of the progressive writers at Lahore on December 5, 1947 at YMCA Hall. He returned to India in January 1948. At the time of Calcutta Congress, the CPI had only four Muslim members in the Central Committee: Syed Sajjad Zaheer and S.S. Yousuf both from the U.P. and Muzaffar Ahmed and Ismail, both from Bengal. Sajjad Zaheer was Incharge of the Muslim front, Progressive Writers Association, and the Editor of one of the party organs ‘Naya Zamana’. Few other prominent Muslim leaders of the party attending the Calcutta Congress, included Mohyuddin Farooqi, Z.A. Ahmed, and Mehmudul Zafar from UP, and Makhdoom Mohyuddin from Hyderabad, Deccan. The Calcutta Congress of Feb-Mar 1948 approved founding of a separate party for Pakistan namely the Communist Party of Pakistan (CPP). The Congress also nominated and approved the appointment of Syed Sajjad Zaheer as the first General Secretary of the proposed party. In line with the approved B.T. Ranadive Thesis, the newly formed CPP was to organize a militant struggle to replace the weak and unstable reactionary regime in Pakistan that had just taken over the reins of power in the new country. In accordance with the party Congress decision, the delegates from areas forming Pakistan, together with few other Muslim delegates from India immediately held a separate meeting presided over by the General Secretary, Sajjad Zaheer to formalize the founding of the Communist Party of Pakistan (CPP) in early March 1948. A Central Committee of the CPP was elected with Jamaluddin Bukhari, Muhammad Hussain Ata and Mirza Ibrahim as its members. In terms of the informal structure of the then Cominform, most of the parties in Europe, America and other parts of the world were to seek ideological and other guidance from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The Communist Party of India (CPI) was, however, not reporting directly to Moscow but to the Communist Party of Great Britain. The Communist Party of Pakistan was made subservient to CPI and was not supposed to approach directly to the British Communist Party in London. Similarly, a separate organising committee was formed for the East Pakistan with Moni Singh as its secretary, reporting directly to CPI Calcutta office instead of CPP headquartered in Lahore. On the question of providing initial support the CPI declined to provide any funds to the newly established CPP but, instead, handed it over its three printing presses, one at Karachi and two at Lahore. Peoples Publishing House at Lahore was also transferred to CPP to use its income to meet local expenses. One of the presses was declared evacuee property by the Punjab government after its Sikh caretaker left for India and the other press was taken over by the Industries department. Having not much cash available to meet daily expenses, Sajjad Zaheer decided to sell the Party’s press in Karachi for Rs. 16,000. To bolster support of the nascent party, Muslim members of CPI were encouraged to migrate to Pakistan and work for organising CPP. Sajjad Zaheer requested his former colleagues and friends in CPI, especially Dr. Ashraf, Z.A. Ahmed, and Ismail to come to Pakistan and help him but they all politely declined. Sibte Hasan (from Azamgarh, UP), Hasan Nasir (from Hyderabad, Deccan) and few others, however, joined him and migrated to Pakistan. Hameed Akhtar who got trapped amid Hindu-Muslim riots in his home town near Ludhiana in East Punjab where he had gone from Bombay to visit his family, somehow managed to escape on a long trail of fire and blood to cross the border and reach Lahore, where the news of his death in the riots in Punjab was already circulating (70). The First Schism Even before its formal incorporation at Calcutta in March 1948, the Communist Party of Pakistan experienced its first leadership dispute. Shortly before partition, there already had developed two sub-groups within the Punjab Communist Party; one was led by Sohan Singh Josh and included Karam Singh Mann and Firozuddin Mansoor while the other was led by Teja Singh Swatantar and included Fazal Elahi Qurban and Abdul Qadir, with support from Qadir Bukhsh Nizamani in Sindh. Nizamani was already disgruntled with the leadership of CPI because ill treatment of him in 1941. In the heat of the partition of India and after being expelled from the party, Teja Singh formed a separate ‘Pakistan Communist Party’ in July 1947. He later migrated to India, handing over the leadership of the new ‘Pakistan Communist Party’ to his protégé, Fazal Elahi Qurban. Teja Singh, subsequently, formed an independent ‘Red Flag Communist Party’ in East Punjab in India. The CPI’s central leadership took Fazal Elahi Qurban’s actions as a violation of party discipline and termed him as ‘disruptionist’. Ajoy Kumar Ghosh during his visit in October 1947 did his investigations and asked Qurban to repent and retrace his steps but Fazal Elahi Qurban evaded signing a statement declaring Teja Singh’s actions and the formation of ‘Pakistan Communist Party’ as ‘anti-party, anti-national and anti-working class revolt’. Ajoy Ghosh accordingly left Qurban out of the interim Provincial Organising Committee. After the arrest of leading communists in Lahore like Eric Cyprian and Firozuddin Mansoor, Qurban with the help of his supporters in the Punjab party attempted to occupy the CPI Punjab office located at 114, McLeod Road, Lahore. Sajjad Zaheer, after assuming his role as the new General Secretary of the CPP formally Issued a charge sheet to Qurban on 18 March, 1948 and finally expelled him and other ‘disruptionists’ from the party in October 1948. This was, perhaps, the first sign of an under-current in the Communist Party reflecting the brewing conflict between the communists in the Punjab and the dominance of the leaders from other regions, particularly from U.P. The already restless communists from Punjab were even more concerned at the prospect of an impending imposition of a leadership from outside, particularly from UP. Although, Ajoy Ghosh (incharge of Punjab Party) was from Bengal but had mostly lived in the UP, Sajjad Zaheer from UP oversaw the work among Muslims and was a strong and likely candidate for leading the yet-to-be-formed new Communist Party of Pakistan. The sitting General Secretary of the CPI, P.C. Joshi, among other many leading communists, was from Almora in northern UP (now included in the newer province of Uttarkhand) had good working and personal relations with Sajjad Zaheer. The apprehensions of the Punjabi communists turned out to be quite true with the predominant positions soon occupied by the communists arriving in large number from UP, C.P., and Deccan. With the expulsion of Fazal Elahi Qurban in Punjab and Abdul Qadir Nizamani in Sindh, Syed Jamaluddin Bukhari was hastily sent from Punjab to take over as the secretary of the Sindh Communist Party. B.T. Ranadive Thesis The new Secretary General of CPI, B.T. Ranadive’s aggressive policies adopted in the Second Congress in Calcutta in 1948 were soon manifested in the party activities everywhere. A spate of calls for general strikes and revolutionary fervor in trade unions in Bombay, Calcutta, Karachi, and other industrial towns was evident. The party rejected the independence as false and partition of India as an ‘imperialist conspiracy’ and exhorted the people for a renewed militant struggle for a real independence. This policy was translated into a catchy slogan: “Yeh Azadi Jhooti Hai.” (This is a false freedom!). Faiz Ahmed Faiz had put it in a subtler and beautifully poetic way: Yeh daagh daagh ujala, yeh shab gazeeda sahar Woh intizar tha jis ka, yeh woh sahar tau nahiN At the time of the creation of Pakistan, there were two organizations of workers i.e. the communist All Indian Trade Union Congress (AITUC) and the reformist Indian Federation of Labour (IFL). After independence these were reconstituted as the Pakistan Trade Union Federation (PTUF) and the All Pakistan Labour Federation. These two federations had only 115,000 members: PTUF with 20,000 members in 38 affiliated unions (1948), concentrated in the railways and APFOL with 95,000 members in 49 unions (1949) was present in many other sectors, particularly, the port workers. The trade union movement in Pakistan had been associated with two international federations viz., the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) formed in 1946 and the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) now ITUC set up in the year 1949. The PTUF was close to the communist party and maintained close relations with the WFTU. The notable leaders of this Federation were Mirza Mohammad Ibrahim, Faiz Ahmad Faiz and Fazal Ilahi Qurban. The avowed object of this Federation was the establishment of workers’ rule in the country. This Federation soon came under the wrath of the government. President Mirza Mohammad Ibrahim was arrested in 1948 and Faiz Ahmad Faiz was charged with conspiracy, three years later. Mr. Fazal Elahi Qurban fled to Moscow. Other members of this Federation were harassed and discouraged from undertaking union activities. When the Communist Party was banned in 1954, the PTUF no longer remained an effective organization.It became dormant and managed to re-emerge in 1970. However, due to above developments, APFOL received recognition and encouragement and with other mergers it emerged as All Pakistan Confederation of Labour (APCOL). The leadership of this Federation was in the hands of such veteran labour leaders as Dr. A. M. Malik, M. A. Khatib, Bashir Ahmad Khan Bakhtiar, Chaudry Rehmatullah, Faiz Mohammad and Aftab Ali. It was a two winged federation i.e. East Pakistan Federation of Labour and West Pakistan Federation of Labour. At the national level, Dr. A. M. Malik was the President of this Federation. He became Labour Minister in 1951 and Governor of East Pakistan in 1971. M. A. Khatib was General Secretary of the Federation. The leadership of the eastern wing of the Federation was in the hands of Aftab Ali and Faiz Mohammad, while the western wing of the Federation was in the hands of Bashir Ahmad Khan Bakhtiar and Chaudry Rehmatullah.   Led by Dr. A. M. Malik, the APCOL had 209 affiliates with 393,000 members (1951) and joined the ICFTU presently the ITUC. By the mid-1950s,APCOL was recognised as the sole representative trade union federation by the government and in 1958 it claimed 375,000 members. Martial law of 1958-61 ended most trade union activity. The government initiated free market capitalism. APCOL started disintegrating at this stage. In 1962, dissatisfied APCOL affiliates, notably the Petroleum Workers’ Federation and the Cigarette Labour Union broke with the confederation to form the Pakistan National Federation of Trade Unions (PNFTU). This Federation was led by Mohammad Sharif and Rashid Mohammad. Further splits in APCOL led to the loss of ICFTU affiliation. In the meantime PNFTU applied and joined ICFTU in November 1964. Each one of APCOL’s fragments claimed to be a ‘National Federation’ or ‘All Pakistan Federation’. One more faction adopted the name – ‘All Pakistan Federation of Trade Unions’ (APFTU) and affiliated with the ICFTU in 1974. The leadership of this faction was in the hands of Bashir Ahmad Khan Bakhtiar and Khurshid Ahmad. The third faction emerged with its earlier name – ‘All Pakistan Federation of Labour’ (APFOL) and was affiliated with ICFTU in 1966. The leadership of this faction was in the hands of Rehmatullah Durrani and Chaudry Rehmatullah and later in the hands of Chaudry Talib Nawaz,Ch Nasim Iqbal and M. Zahoor Awan. Islamic unionism also emerged. The small Pakistan Federation of Labour, created in 1960, became the National Labour Federation (NLF) in 1964 and introduced trade unionism based on fundamentalist Islamic themes. Professor Shafi Malik was its founding leader. The leadership of this Federation is presently in the hands of Hafiz Suleman Butt and Mehmood Ali Khan. In1972, the victory of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s PPP party brought major labour unrest. Dozens of factories were occupied, self-managementcommittees were established but there was also extensive trade union fragmentation resulting in multiplicity of trade unions. Employers were reluctantly obliged to recognize unions. However, Bhutto also created his own trade union, the Peoples’ Labour Bureau. By 1977 trade union membership reached a record one million figure. Pakistan,[c] officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan,[d] is a country in South Asia. It is the world's fifth-most populous country with a population exceeding 212.2 million. It is the 33rd-largest country by area, spanning 881,913 square kilometres (340,509 square miles). Pakistan has a 1,046-kilometre (650-mile) coastline along the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by India to the east, Afghanistan to the west, Iran to the southwest, and China to the northeast. It is separated narrowly from Tajikistan by Afghanistan's Wakhan Corridor in the northwest, and also shares a maritime border with Oman. The territory that now constitutes Pakistan was the site of several ancient cultures and intertwined with the history of the broader Indian subcontinent. The ancient history involves the Neolithic site of Mehrgarh and the Bronze Age Indus Valley Civilisation, and was later home to kingdoms ruled by people of different faiths and cultures, including Hindus, Indo-Greeks, Muslims, Turco-Mongols, Afghans and Sikhs. The area has been ruled by numerous empires and dynasties, including the Persian Achaemenid Empire, Alexander III of Macedon, the Seleucid Empire, the Indian Maurya Empire, the Kushan Empire, the Gupta Empire,[15] the Arab Umayyad Caliphate, the Ghurid Sultanate, the Ghaznavids Empire, the Delhi Sultanate, the Mongol Empire, the Mughal Empire, the Sur Empire,[16] the Afghan Durrani Empire, the Sikh Empire (partially) and, most recently, the British Indian Empire.[17][18] Pakistan gained independence in 1947 as a homeland for Indian Muslims following the Pakistan Movement, which sought statehood for the Muslim-majority regions of British India through partition.[19][20][21] It is an ethnically and linguistically diverse country, with similarly diverse geography and wildlife. Initially a dominion, Pakistan adopted a constitution in 1956, becoming an Islamic republic. An ethnic civil war and Indian military intervention in 1971 resulted in the secession of East Pakistan as the new country of Bangladesh.[22] In 1973, Pakistan adopted a new constitution which stipulated that all laws are to conform to the injunctions of Islam as laid down in the Quran and Sunnah.[23] In 2008, Pakistan transitioned to civilian rule.[24] In 2010, Pakistan adopted a parliamentary system with periodic elections.[25][26] A middle power,[27][28][29][30][31][32] Pakistan has the sixth-largest standing armed forces in the world and is also a nuclear power as well as a declared nuclear-weapons state. It is ranked among the emerging and growth-leading economies of the world,[33][34] and is backed by one of the world's largest and fastest-growing middle class populations.[35][36] Pakistan's political history since independence has been characterized by periods of military rule, political instability and conflicts with India. The country continues to face challenging problems, including overpopulation, poverty, illiteracy and corruption.[37][38][39] Pakistan is a member of the UN, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the OIC, the Commonwealth of Nations, the SAARC, the Islamic Military Counter Terrorism Coalition, and is a major non-NATO ally. Contents 1 Etymology 2 History 2.1 Early and medieval age 2.2 Islamic conquest 2.3 Colonial period 2.4 Pakistan Movement 2.5 Independence and modern Pakistan 3 Role of Islam in Pakistan 4 Geography, environment, and climate 4.1 Flora and fauna 5 Government and politics 5.1 Foreign relations 5.1.1 Relations with China 5.1.2 Emphasis on relations with Muslim world 5.2 Administrative divisions 5.3 Kashmir conflict 5.4 Law enforcement 5.5 Human rights 6 Military 6.1 Military history 7 Economy 7.1 Agriculture and primary sector 7.2 Industry 7.3 Services 7.4 Tourism 8 Infrastructure 8.1 Nuclear power and energy 8.2 Transport 8.2.1 Motorways 8.2.2 Highways 8.2.3 Railways 8.2.4 Airports 8.2.5 Seaports 8.2.6 Metro 8.2.7 Flyovers and Underpasses 8.3 Science and technology 8.4 Education 9 Demographics 9.1 Languages 9.2 Immigration 9.3 Ethnic groups 9.4 Urbanisation 9.5 Religion 9.5.1 Islam 9.5.2 Hinduism 9.5.3 Christianity and other religions 10 Culture and society 10.1 Clothing, arts, and fashion 10.2 Media and entertainment 10.3 Diaspora 10.4 Literature and philosophy 10.5 Architecture 10.6 Food and drink 10.6.1 Traditional food 10.6.2 Fast food 10.7 Sports 11 See also 12 Notes 13 References 14 Bibliography 15 External links 15.1 Government 15.2 General information Etymology The name Pakistan literally means "land of the pure" in Urdu and Persian. It alludes to the word پاک (pāk), meaning "pure" in Persian and Pashto.[40] The suffix ـستان (-stān) is a Persian suffix meaning the place of, and also recalls the synonymous (and cognate) Sanskrit word स्थान (sthāna).[41] The name of the country was coined in 1933 as Pakstan by Choudhry Rahmat Ali, a Pakistan Movement activist, who published it in his pamphlet Now or Never,[42] using it as an acronym ("thirty million Muslim brethren who live in PAKSTAN") referring to the names of the five northern regions of British India: Punjab, Afghania, Kashmir, Sindh, and Baluchistan.[43][44][45] The letter i was incorporated to ease pronunciation.[46] History Main article: History of Pakistan See also: Outline of South Asian history You may need rendering support to display the Urdu text in this article correctly. Early and medieval age Main articles: Indus Valley Civilization, Vedic Period, Mauryan Empire, Indo-Greek Kingdom, Gupta Empire, Pala Empire, Sikh Empire, and Mughal Empire Indus Priest King Statue from Mohenjo-Daro. Some of the earliest ancient human civilisations in South Asia originated from areas encompassing present-day Pakistan.[47] The earliest known inhabitants in the region were Soanian during the Lower Paleolithic, of whom stone tools have been found in the Soan Valley of Punjab.[48] The Indus region, which covers most of present day Pakistan, was the site of several successive ancient cultures including the Neolithic Mehrgarh[49] and the Bronze Age Indus Valley Civilisation[50][51][52][53][54] (2,800–1,800 BCE) at Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro.[55][56] Standing Buddha from Gandhara, Greco-Buddhist art, 1st–2nd century AD. The Vedic period (1500–500 BCE) was characterised by an Indo-Aryan culture; during this period the Vedas, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism, were composed, and this culture later became well established in the region.[57][58] Multan was an important Hindu pilgrimage centre.[59] The Vedic civilisation flourished in the ancient Gandhāran city of Takṣaśilā, now Taxila in the Punjab, which was founded around 1000 BCE.[60][49] Successive ancient empires and kingdoms ruled the region: the Persian Achaemenid Empire (around 519 BCE), Alexander the Great's empire in 326 BCE[61] and the Maurya Empire, founded by Chandragupta Maurya and extended by Ashoka the Great, until 185 BCE.[49] The Indo-Greek Kingdom founded by Demetrius of Bactria (180–165 BCE) included Gandhara and Punjab and reached its greatest extent under Menander (165–150 BCE), prospering the Greco-Buddhist culture in the region.[49][62] Taxila had one of the earliest universities and centres of higher education in the world, which was established during the late Vedic period in 6th century BCE.[63][64] The school consisted of several monasteries without large dormitories or lecture halls where the religious instruction was provided on an individualistic basis.[64] The ancient university was documented by the invading forces of Alexander the Great and was also recorded by Chinese pilgrims in the 4th or 5th century CE.[65][66][67][68] At its zenith, the Rai Dynasty (489–632 CE) of Sindh ruled this region and the surrounding territories.[69] The Pala Dynasty was the last Buddhist empire, which, under Dharmapala and Devapala, stretched across South Asia from what is now Bangladesh through Northern India to Pakistan. Islamic conquest The Arab conqueror Muhammad bin Qasim conquered Sindh in 711 CE.[70][71][72][73][74] The Pakistan government's official chronology claims this as the time when the foundation of Pakistan was laid[70][75][76] but the concept of Pakistan came in 19th century. The Early Medieval period (642–1219 CE) witnessed the spread of Islam in the region. During this period, Sufi missionaries played a pivotal role in converting a majority of the regional Buddhist and Hindu population to Islam.[77] These developments set the stage for the rule of several successive Muslim empires in the region, including the Ghaznavid Empire (975–1187 CE), the Ghorid Kingdom, and the Delhi Sultanate (1206–1526 CE). The Lodi dynasty, the last of the Delhi Sultanate, was replaced by the Mughal Empire (1526–1857 CE). Badshahi Mosque, Lahore The Mughals introduced Persian literature and high culture, establishing the roots of Indo-Persian culture in the region.[78] From the region of modern-day Pakistan, key cities during the Mughal rule were Lahore and Thatta,[79] both of which were chosen as the site of impressive Mughal buildings.[80] In the early 16th century, the region remained under the Mughal Empire ruled by Muslim emperors.[81] By the early 18th century, increasing European influence contributed to the slow disintegration of the Mughal Empire as the lines between commercial and political dominance became increasingly blurred.[81] During this time, the English East India Company had established coastal outposts.[81] Control over the seas, greater resources, technology, and British military protection led the Company to increasingly flex its military muscle, allowing the Company to gain control over the subcontinent by 1765 and sideline European competitors.[82] Expanding access beyond Bengal and the subsequent increased strength and size of its army enabled it to annex or subdue most of region by the 1820s.[81] Many historians see this as the start of the region's colonial period.[81] By this time, with its economic power severely curtailed by the British parliament and itself effectively made an arm of British administration, the Company began more deliberately to enter non-economic arenas such as education, social reform, and culture.[81] Such reforms included the enforcement of the English Education Act in 1835 and the introduction of the Indian Civil Service (ICS).[83] Traditional madrasahs—primary institutions of higher learning for Muslims in the subcontinent—were no longer supported by the English Crown, and nearly all of the madrasahs lost their financial endowment.[84] Colonial period Main articles: Colonial India, Aligarh movement, and British Raj Sir Syed Ahmad Khan (1817–1898), whose vision (Two-nation theory) formed the basis of Pakistan Sir Syed Ahmad Khan (1817–1898), whose vision formed the basis of Pakistan Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876–1948) served as Pakistan's first Governor-General and the leader of the Pakistan Movement Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876–1948) served as Pakistan's first Governor-General and the leader of the Pakistan Movement The gradual decline of the Mughal Empire in the early 18th century enabled the Sikh Empire to control larger areas until the British East India Company gained ascendancy over South Asia.[85] A rebellion in 1857 called the Sepoy mutiny of Bengal was the region's major armed struggle against the British Empire and Queen Victoria.[86] Divergence in the relationship between Hinduism and Islam created a major rift in British India that led to motivated religious violence in British India.[87] The language controversy further escalated the tensions between Hindus and Muslims.[88] The Hindu renaissance witnessed an awakening of intellectualism in traditional Hinduism and saw the emergence of more assertive influence in the social and political spheres in British India.[89][90] A Muslim intellectual movement, founded by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan to counter the Hindu renaissance, envisioned, as well as advocated for the two-nation theory,[85] and led to the creation of the All-India Muslim League in 1906. In contrast to the Indian National Congress's anti-British efforts, the Muslim League was a pro-British movement whose political program inherited the British values that would shape Pakistan's future civil society.[91] In events during World War I, British Intelligence foiled an anti-English conspiracy involving the nexus of Congress and the German Empire.[citation needed] The largely non-violent independence struggle led by the Indian Congress engaged millions of protesters in mass campaigns of civil disobedience in the 1920s and 1930s against the British Empire.[92][93][94] Clock Tower, Faisalabad built by British Government in 19th Century The Muslim League slowly rose to mass popularity in the 1930s amid fears of under-representation and neglect of British Muslims in politics. In his presidential address of 29 December 1930, Allama Iqbal called for "the amalgamation of North-West Muslim-majority Indian states" consisting of Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, Sind, and Baluchistan.[95] The perceived neglect of Muslim interests by Congress led British provincial governments during the period of 1937–39 convinced Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan to espouse the two-nation theory and led the Muslim League to adopt the Lahore Resolution of 1940 presented by Sher-e-Bangla A.K. Fazlul Haque, popularly known as the Pakistan Resolution.[85] In World War II, Jinnah and British-educated founding fathers in the Muslim League supported the United Kingdom's war efforts, countering opposition against it whilst working towards Sir Syed's vision.[96] Pakistan Movement Main article: Pakistan Movement Further information: History of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, Indian independence movement, and Partition of British India The 1946 elections resulted in the Muslim League winning 90 percent of the seats reserved for Muslims. Thus, the 1946 election was effectively a plebiscite in which the Indian Muslims were to vote on the creation of Pakistan, a plebiscite won by the Muslim League.[97] This victory was assisted by the support given to the Muslim League by the support of the landowners of Sindh and Punjab. The Congress, which initially denied the Muslim League's claim of being the sole representative of Indian Muslims, was now forced to recognise the fact.[97] The British had no alternative except to take Jinnah's views into account as he had emerged as the sole spokesperson of the entirety of British India's Muslims. However, the British did not want colonial India to be partitioned, and in one last effort to prevent it, they devised the Cabinet Mission plan.[98] As the cabinet mission failed, the British government announced its intention to end the British Rule in 1946–47.[99] Nationalists in British India—including Jawaharlal Nehru and Abul Kalam Azad of Congress, Jinnah of the All-India Muslim League, and Master Tara Singh representing the Sikhs—agreed to the proposed terms of transfer of power and independence in June 1947 with the Viceroy of India, Lord Mountbatten of Burma.[100] As the United Kingdom agreed to the partitioning of India in 1947, the modern state of Pakistan was established on 14 August 1947 (27th of Ramadan in 1366 of the Islamic Calendar), amalgamating the Muslim-majority eastern and northwestern regions of British India.[94] It comprised the provinces of Balochistan, East Bengal, the North-West Frontier Province, West Punjab, and Sindh.[85][100] In the riots that accompanied the partition in Punjab Province, it is believed that between 200,000 and 2,000,000[101][102][103][104][105][106] people were killed in what some have described as a retributive genocide between the religions[107][108] while 50,000 Muslim women were abducted and raped by Hindu and Sikh men and 33,000 Hindu and Sikh women also experienced the same fate at the hands of Muslims.[109][110][111][112] Around 6.5 million Muslims moved from India to West Pakistan and 4.7 million Hindus and Sikhs moved from West Pakistan to India.[113] It was the largest mass migration in human history.[114][115][116] Dispute over Jammu and Kashmir led to the First Kashmir War in 1948.[117][118] Independence and modern Pakistan Main articles: Dominion of Pakistan and History of Pakistan File:Pakistan.ogv The American CIA film on Pakistan made in 1950 examines the history and geography of Pakistan. "You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place or worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed – that has nothing to do with the business of the State." —Muhammad Ali Jinnah's first speech to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan[119] After independence in 1947, Jinnah, the President of the Muslim League, became the nation's first Governor-General as well as the first President-Speaker of the Parliament,[citation needed] but he died of tuberculosis on 11 September 1948.[120] Meanwhile, Pakistan's founding fathers agreed to appoint Liaquat Ali Khan, the secretary-general of the party, the nation's first Prime Minister. With dominion status in the Commonwealth of Nations, independent Pakistan had two British monarchs before it became a republic.[citation needed] The creation of Pakistan was never fully accepted by many British leaders, among them Lord Mountbatten.[121] Mountbatten clearly expressed his lack of support and faith in the Muslim League's idea of Pakistan.[122] Jinnah refused Mountbatten's offer to serve as Governor-General of Pakistan.[123] When Mountbatten was asked by Collins and Lapierre if he would have sabotaged Pakistan had he known that Jinnah was dying of tuberculosis, he replied 'most probably'.[124] Maulana Shabbir Ahmad Usmani, a respected Deobandi alim (scholar) who occupied the position of Shaykh al-Islam in Pakistan in 1949, and Maulana Mawdudi of Jamaat-i-Islami played a pivotal role in the demand for an Islamic constitution. Mawdudi demanded that the Constituent Assembly make an explicit declaration affirming the "supreme sovereignty of God" and the supremacy of the shariah in Pakistan.[125] A significant result of the efforts of the Jamaat-i-Islami and the ulama was the passage of the Objectives Resolution in March 1949. The Objectives Resolution, which Liaquat Ali Khan called the second most important step in Pakistan's history, declared that "sovereignty over the entire universe belongs to God Almighty alone and the authority which He has delegated to the State of Pakistan through its people for being exercised within the limits prescribed by Him is a sacred trust". The Objectives Resolution has been incorporated as a preamble to the constitutions of 1956, 1962, and 1973.[126] Democracy was stalled by the martial law that had been enforced by President Iskander Mirza, who was replaced by army chief, General Ayub Khan. After adopting a presidential system in 1962, the country experienced exceptional growth until a second war with India in 1965 that led to an economic downturn and wide-scale public disapproval in 1967.[127][128] Consolidating control from Ayub Khan in 1969, President Yahya Khan had to deal with a devastating cyclone that caused 500,000 deaths in East Pakistan.[129] Signing of the Tashkent Declaration to end hostilities with India in 1965 in Tashkent, USSR, by President Ayub alongside Bhutto (centre) and Aziz Ahmed (left) In 1970 Pakistan held its first democratic elections since independence, meant to mark a transition from military rule to democracy, but after the East Pakistani Awami League won against the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), Yahya Khan and the military establishment refused to hand over power.[130][131] Operation Searchlight, a military crackdown on the Bengali nationalist movement, led to a declaration of independence and the waging of a war of liberation by the Bengali Mukti Bahini forces in East Pakistan.[131][132] However, the conflict was described in West Pakistan as a civil war as opposed to a war of liberation.[133] Independent researchers estimate that between 300,000 and 500,000 civilians died during this period while the Bangladesh government puts the number of dead at three million,[134] a figure that is now nearly universally regarded as excessively inflated.[135] Some academics such as Rudolph Rummel and Rounaq Jahan say both sides[136] committed genocide; others such as Richard Sisson and Leo E. Rose believe there was no genocide.[137] In response to India's support for the insurgency in East Pakistan, preemptive strikes on India by Pakistan's air force, navy, and marines sparked a conventional war in 1971 that resulted in an Indian victory and East Pakistan gaining independence as Bangladesh.[131] With Pakistan surrendering in the war, Yahya Khan was replaced by Zulfikar Ali Bhutto as president; the country worked towards promulgating its constitution and putting the country on the road to democracy. Democratic rule resumed from 1972 to 1977—an era of self-consciousness, intellectual leftism, nationalism, and nationwide reconstruction.[138] In 1972 Pakistan embarked on an ambitious plan to develop its nuclear deterrence capability with the goal of preventing any foreign invasion; the country's first nuclear power plant was inaugurated in that same year.[139][140] Accelerated in response to India's first nuclear test in 1974, this crash program was completed in 1979.[140] Democracy ended with a military coup in 1977 against the leftist PPP, which saw General Zia-ul-Haq become the president in 1978. From 1977 to 1988, President Zia's corporatisation and economic Islamisation initiatives led to Pakistan becoming one of the fastest-growing economies in South Asia.[141] While building up the country's nuclear program, increasing Islamisation,[142] and the rise of a homegrown conservative philosophy, Pakistan helped subsidise and distribute US resources to factions of the mujahideen against the USSR's intervention in communist Afghanistan.[143][144] Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province became a base for the anti-Soviet Afghan fighters, with the province's influential Deobandi ulama playing a significant role in encouraging and organising the 'jihad'.[145] President Zia died in a plane crash in 1988, and Benazir Bhutto, daughter of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was elected as the country's first female Prime Minister. The PPP was followed by conservative Pakistan Muslim League (N), and over the next decade the leaders of the two parties fought for power, alternating in office while the country's situation worsened; economic indicators fell sharply, in contrast to the 1980s. This period is marked by prolonged stagflation, instability, corruption, nationalism, geopolitical rivalry with India, and the clash of left wing-right wing ideologies.[146][147] As PML (N) secured a supermajority in elections in 1997, Sharif authorised nuclear testings (See:Chagai-I and Chagai-II), as a retaliation to the second nuclear tests ordered by India, led by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in May 1998.[148] President George W. Bush meets with President Musharraf in Islamabad during his 2006 visit to Pakistan. Military tension between the two countries in the Kargil district led to the Kargil War of 1999, and turmoil in civic-military relations allowed General Pervez Musharraf to take over through a bloodless coup d'état.[149][150] Musharraf governed Pakistan as chief executive from 1999 to 2001 and as President from 2001 to 2008—a period of enlightenment, social liberalism, extensive economic reforms,[151] and direct involvement in the US-led war on terrorism. When the National Assembly historically completed its first full five-year term on 15 November 2007, the new elections were called by the Election Commission.[152] After the assassination of Benazir Bhutto in 2007, the PPP secured the most votes in the elections of 2008, appointing party member Yousaf Raza Gillani as Prime Minister.[153] Threatened with impeachment, President Musharraf resigned on 18 August 2008, and was succeeded by Asif Ali Zardari.[154][155][156] Clashes with the judicature prompted Gillani's disqualification from the Parliament and as the Prime Minister in June 2012.[157] By its own financial calculations, Pakistan's involvement in the war on terrorism has cost up to $118 billion,[158] sixty thousand casualties and more than 1.8 million displaced civilians.[159] The general election held in 2013 saw the PML (N) almost achieve a supermajority, following which Nawaz Sharif was elected as the Prime Minister, returning to the post for the third time in fourteen years, in a democratic transition.[160] In 2018, Imran Khan (the chairman of PTI) won the 2018 Pakistan general election with 116 general seats and became the 22nd Prime Minister of Pakistan in election of National Assembly of Pakistan for Prime Minister by getting 176 votes against Shehbaz Sharif (the chairman of PML (N)) who got 96 votes.[161] Role of Islam in Pakistan See also: Secularism in Pakistan Pakistan is the only country to have been created in the name of Islam.[17][18] The idea of Pakistan, which had received overwhelming popular support among Indian Muslims, especially those in the provinces of British India where Muslims were in a minority such as the United Provinces,[162] was articulated in terms of an Islamic state by the Muslim League leadership, the ulama (Islamic clergy) and Jinnah.[163] Jinnah had developed a close association with the ulama and upon his death was described by one such alim, Maulana Shabbir Ahmad Usmani, as the greatest Muslim after Aurangzeb and as someone who desired to unite the Muslims of the world under the banner of Islam.[164][165] The Objectives Resolution in March 1949, which declared God as the sole sovereign over the entire universe, represented the first formal step to transform Pakistan into an Islamic state.[166][126] Muslim League leader Chaudhry Khaliquzzaman asserted that Pakistan could only truly become an Islamic state after bringing all believers of Islam into a single political unit.[167] Keith Callard, one of the earliest scholars on Pakistani politics, observed that Pakistanis believed in the essential unity of purpose and outlook in the Muslim world and assumed that Muslim from other countries would share their views on the relationship between religion and nationality.[168] The Friday Prayers at the Badshahi Mosque in Lahore However, Pakistan's pan-Islamist sentiments for a united Islamic bloc called Islamistan were not shared by other Muslim governments,[169] although Islamists such as the Grand Mufti of Palestine, Al-Haj Amin al-Husseini, and leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood, became drawn to the country. Pakistan's desire for an international organization of Muslim countries was fulfilled in the 1970s when the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) was formed.[170] The strongest opposition to the Islamist ideological paradigm being imposed on the state came from the Bengali Muslims of East Pakistan[171] whose educated class, according to a survey by social scientist Nasim Ahmad Jawed, preferred secularism and focused on ethnic identity unlike educated West Pakistanis who tended to prefer an Islamic identity.[172] The Islamist party Jamaat-e-Islami considered Pakistan to be an Islamic state and believed Bengali nationalism to be unacceptable. In the 1971 conflict over East Pakistan, the Jamaat-e-Islami fought the Bengali nationalists on the Pakistan Army's side.[173] After Pakistan's first ever general elections the 1973 Constitution was created by an elected Parliament.[174] The Constitution declared Pakistan an Islamic Republic and Islam as the state religion. It also stated that all laws would have to be brought into accordance with the injunctions of Islam as laid down in the Quran and Sunnah and that no law repugnant to such injunctions could be enacted.[175] The 1973 Constitution also created certain institutions such as the Shariat Court and the Council of Islamic Ideology to channel the interpretation and application of Islam.[176] Pakistan's leftist Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto faced vigorous opposition which coalesced into a movement united under the revivalist banner of Nizam-e-Mustafa ("Rule of the Prophet")[177] which aimed to establish an Islamic state based on Sharia laws. Bhutto agreed to some Islamist demands before being overthrown in a coup.[178] In 1977, after taking power from Bhutto in a coup d'état, General Zia-ul-Haq, who came from a religious background,[179] committed himself to establishing an Islamic state and enforcing sharia law.[178] Zia established separate Shariat judicial courts[180] and court benches[181][182] to judge legal cases using Islamic doctrine.[183] Zia bolstered the influence of the ulama (Islamic clergy) and the Islamic parties.[183] Zia-ul-Haq forged a strong alliance between the military and Deobandi institutions[184] and even though most Barelvi ulama[185] and only a few Deobandi scholars had supported Pakistan's creation, Islamic state politics came to be mostly in favour of Deobandi (and later Ahl-e-Hadith/Salafi) institutions instead of Barelvi.[186] Sectarian tensions increased with Zia's anti-Shia policies.[187] According to a Pew Research Center (PEW) opinion poll, a majority of Pakistanis support making Sharia the official law of the land.[188] In a survey of several Muslim countries, PEW also found that Pakistanis tend to identify with their religion more than their nationality in contrast to Muslims in other nations such as Egypt, Indonesia and Jordan.[189] Geography, environment, and climate Main articles: Extreme weather records in Pakistan, Geography of Pakistan, Environment of Pakistan, Climate of Pakistan, Tropical cyclones and tornadoes in Pakistan, and List of beaches in Pakistan A satellite image showing the topography of Pakistan Köppen climate classification of Pakistan The geography and climate of Pakistan are extremely diverse, and the country is home to a wide variety of wildlife.[190] Pakistan covers an area of 881,913 km2 (340,509 sq mi), approximately equal to the combined land areas of France and the United Kingdom. It is the 33rd-largest nation by total area, although this ranking varies depending on how the disputed territory of Kashmir is counted. Pakistan has a 1,046 km (650 mi) coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south[191] and land borders of 6,774 km (4,209 mi) in total: 2,430 km (1,510 mi) with Afghanistan, 523 km (325 mi) with China, 2,912 km (1,809 mi) with India and 909 km (565 mi) with Iran.[192] It shares a marine border with Oman,[193] and is separated from Tajikistan by the cold, narrow Wakhan Corridor.[194] Pakistan occupies a geopolitically important location at the crossroads of South Asia, the Middle East, and Central Asia.[195] Geologically, Pakistan is located in the Indus–Tsangpo Suture Zone and overlaps the Indian tectonic plate in its Sindh and Punjab provinces; Balochistan and most of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are within the Eurasian plate, mainly on the Iranian plateau. Gilgit–Baltistan and Azad Kashmir lie along the edge of the Indian plate and hence are prone to violent earthquakes. This region has the highest rates of seismicity and the largest earthquakes in the Himalaya region.[196] Ranging from the coastal areas of the south to the glaciated mountains of the north, Pakistan's landscapes vary from plains to deserts, forests, hills, and plateaus.[197] K2, the second-highest mountain on Earth Katpana Desert, the world's highest cold desert Nanga Parbat, the ninth-highest mountain on Earth The Deosai Plains are the world's second highest alpine plain. Pakistan is divided into three major geographic areas: the northern highlands, the Indus River plain, and the Balochistan Plateau.[198] The northern highlands contain the Karakoram, Hindu Kush, and Pamir mountain ranges (see mountains of Pakistan), which contain some of the world's highest peaks, including five of the fourteen eight-thousanders (mountain peaks over 8,000 metres or 26,250 feet), which attract adventurers and mountaineers from all over the world, notably K2 (8,611 m or 28,251 ft) and Nanga Parbat (8,126 m or 26,660 ft).[199] The Balochistan Plateau lies in the west and the Thar Desert in the east. The 1,609 km (1,000 mi) Indus River and its tributaries flow through the country from the Kashmir region to the Arabian Sea. There is an expanse of alluvial plains along it in the Punjab and Sindh.[200] The climate varies from tropical to temperate, with arid conditions in the coastal south. There is a monsoon season with frequent flooding due to heavy rainfall, and a dry season with significantly less rainfall or none at all. There are four distinct seasons in Pakistan: a cool, dry winter from December through February; a hot, dry spring from March through May; the summer rainy season, or southwest monsoon period, from June through September; and the retreating monsoon period of October and November.[85] Rainfall varies greatly from year to year, and patterns of alternate flooding and drought are common.[201] Flora and fauna Main articles: Flora of Pakistan and Fauna of Pakistan The diversity of the landscape and climate in Pakistan allows a wide variety of trees and plants to flourish. The forests range from coniferous alpine and subalpine trees such as spruce, pine, and deodar cedar in the extreme northern mountains to deciduous trees in most of the country (for example, the mulberry-like shisham found in the Sulaiman Mountains), to palms such as coconut and date in the southern Punjab, southern Balochistan, and all of Sindh. The western hills are home to juniper, tamarisk, coarse grasses, and scrub plants. Mangrove forests form much of the coastal wetlands along the coast in the south.[202] Coniferous forests are found at altitudes ranging from 1,000 to 4,000 metres (3,300 to 13,100 feet) in most of the northern and northwestern highlands. In the xeric regions of Balochistan, date palm and Ephedra are common. In most of the Punjab and Sindh, the Indus plains support tropical and subtropical dry and moist broadleaf forest as well as tropical and xeric shrublands. These forests are mostly of mulberry, acacia, and eucalyptus.[203] About 2.2% or 1,687,000 hectares (16,870 km2) of Pakistan was forested in 2010.[204] Bear Tibetan wolf Snow leopard The fauna of Pakistan also reflects the country's varied climate. Around 668 bird species are found there,[205][206] including crows, sparrows, mynas, hawks, falcons, and eagles. Palas, Kohistan, has a significant population of western tragopan.[207] Many birds sighted in Pakistan are migratory, coming from Europe, Central Asia, and India.[208] The southern plains are home to mongooses, small Indian civet, hares, the Asiatic jackal, the Indian pangolin, the jungle cat, and the desert cat. There are mugger crocodiles in the Indus, and wild boar, deer, porcupines, and small rodents in the surrounding areas. The sandy scrublands of central Pakistan are home to Asiatic jackals, striped hyenas, wildcats, and leopards.[209][210] The lack of vegetative cover, the severe climate, and the impact of grazing on the deserts have left wild animals in a precarious position. The chinkara is the only animal that can still be found in significant numbers in Cholistan. A small number of nilgai are found along the Pakistan–India border and in some parts of Cholistan.[209][211] A wide variety of animals live in the mountainous north, including the Marco Polo sheep, the urial (a subspecies of wild sheep), the markhor goat, the ibex goat, the Asian black bear, and the Himalayan brown bear.[209][212][213] Among the rare animals found in the area are the snow leopard[212] and the blind Indus river dolphin, of which there are believed to be about 1,100 remaining, protected at the Indus River Dolphin Reserve in Sindh.[212][214] In total, 174 mammals, 177 reptiles, 22 amphibians, 198 freshwater fish species and 5,000 species of invertebrates (including insects) have been recorded in Pakistan.[205][206] The flora and fauna of Pakistan suffer from a number of problems. Pakistan has the second-highest rate of deforestation in the world, which, along with hunting and pollution, has had adverse effects on the ecosystem. The government has established a large number of protected areas, wildlife sanctuaries, and game reserves to address these issues.[205][206] Government and politics Main articles: Government of Pakistan, Politics of Pakistan, Political history of Pakistan, and Human rights in Pakistan Parliament House Pakistan's political experience is essentially related to the struggle of Indian Muslims to regain the power they lost to British colonisation.[215] Pakistan is a democratic parliamentary federal republic, with Islam as the state religion.[4] The first constitution was adopted in 1956 but suspended by Ayub Khan in 1958, who replaced it with the second constitution in 1962.[94] A complete and comprehensive constitution was adopted in 1973, it was suspended by Zia-ul-Haq in 1977 but reinstated in 1985. This constitution is the country's most important document, laying the foundations of the current government.[192] The Pakistani military establishment has played an influential role in mainstream politics throughout Pakistan's political history.[94] The periods 1958–1971, 1977–1988, and 1999–2008 saw military coups that resulted in the imposition of martial law and military commanders who governed as de facto presidents.[216] Today Pakistan has a multi-party parliamentary system with clear division of powers and checks and balances among the branches of government. The first successful democratic transition occurred in May 2013. Politics in Pakistan is centred on, and dominated by, a homegrown social philosophy comprising a blend of ideas from socialism, conservatism, and the third way. As of the general elections held in 2013, the three main political parties in the country are: the centre-right conservative Pakistan Muslim League-N; the centre-left socialist PPP; and the centrist and third-way Pakistan Movement for Justice (PTI). Head of State: The President, who is elected by an Electoral College is the ceremonial head of the state and is the civilian commander-in-chief of the Pakistan Armed Forces (with the Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee as principal military adviser), but military appointments and key confirmations in the armed forces are made by the Prime Minister after reviewing the reports on candidates' merit and performance. Almost all appointed officers in the judicature, military, the chairman joint chiefs, joint staff, and legislature require the executive confirmation from the Prime Minister, whom the President must consult by law. However, the powers to pardon and grant clemency lie with the President of Pakistan. Legislative: The bicameral legislature comprises a 104-member Senate (upper house) and a 342-member National Assembly (lower house). Members of the National Assembly are elected through the first-past-the-post system under universal adult suffrage, representing electoral districts known as National Assembly constituencies. According to the constitution, the 70 seats reserved for women and religious minorities are allocated to the political parties according to their proportional representation. Senate members are elected by provincial legislators, with all the provinces having equal representation. Prime Minister's Office Executive: The Prime Minister is usually the leader of the majority rule party or a coalition in the National Assembly— the lower house. The Prime Minister serves as the head of government and is designated to exercise as the country's chief executive. The Prime Minister is responsible for appointing a cabinet consisting of ministers and advisers as well as running the government operations, taking and authorising executive decisions, appointments and recommendations of senior civil servants that require executive confirmation of the Prime Minister. Provincial governments: Each of the four provinces has a similar system of government, with a directly elected Provincial Assembly in which the leader of the largest party or coalition is elected Chief Minister. Chief Ministers oversee the provincial governments and head the provincial cabinet. It is common in Pakistan to have different ruling parties or coalitions in each of the provinces. The provincial bureaucracy is headed by the Chief Secretary, who is appointed by the Prime Minister. The provincial assemblies have power to make laws and approve the provincial budget which is commonly presented by the provincial finance minister every fiscal year. Provincial governors who are the ceremonial heads of the provinces are appointed by the President.[192] Supreme Court of Pakistan Judicature: The judiciary of Pakistan is a hierarchical system with two classes of courts: the superior (or higher) judiciary and the subordinate (or lower) judiciary. The Chief Justice of Pakistan is the chief judge who oversees the judicature's court system at all levels of command. The superior judiciary is composed of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, the Federal Shariat Court and five High Courts, with the Supreme Court at the apex. The Constitution of Pakistan entrusts the superior judiciary with the obligation to preserve, protect and defend the constitution.Other regions of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit–Baltistan have separate court systems. Foreign relations Main article: Foreign relations of Pakistan (L–R) English: Motorcade for President Mohammad Ayub Khan of Pakistan. In open car (Lincoln-Mercury Continental with bubble top): Secret Service agent William Greer (driving); Military Aide to the President General Chester V. Clifton (front seat, centre); Secret Service Agent Gerald "Jerry" Behn (front seat, right, partially hidden); President Mohammad Ayub Khan (standing); President John F. Kennedy (standing). Crowd watching. 14th Street, Washington, D.C. Ayub Khan (President of Pakistan) with U.S. President John F. Kennedy in 1961. Since Independence, Pakistan has attempted to balance its relations with foreign nations.[217][218][219] Pakistan is a strong ally of China, with both countries placing considerable importance on the maintenance of an extremely close and supportive special relationship.[220][221][222] It is also a major non-NATO ally of the United States in the war against terrorism—a status achieved in 2004.[223] Pakistan's foreign policy and geostrategy mainly focus on the economy and security against threats to its national identity and territorial integrity, and on the cultivation of close relations with other Muslim countries.[224] The Kashmir conflict remains the major point of contention between Pakistan and India; three of their four wars were fought over this territory.[225] Due partly to difficulties in relations with its geopolitical rival India, Pakistan maintains close political relations with Turkey and Iran,[226] and both countries have been a focal point in Pakistan's foreign policy.[226] Saudi Arabia also maintains a respected position in Pakistan's foreign policy. A non-signatory party of the Treaty on Nuclear Non-Proliferation, Pakistan is an influential member of the IAEA.[227] In recent events, Pakistan has blocked an international treaty to limit fissile material, arguing that the "treaty would target Pakistan specifically".[228] In the 20th century, Pakistan's nuclear deterrence program focused on countering India's nuclear ambitions in the region, and nuclear tests by India eventually led Pakistan to reciprocate to maintain a geopolitical balance as becoming a nuclear power.[229] Currently, Pakistan maintains a policy of credible minimum deterrence, calling its program vital nuclear deterrence against foreign aggression.[230][231] Located in the strategic and geopolitical corridor of the world's major maritime oil supply lines and communication fibre optics, Pakistan has proximity to the natural resources of Central Asian countries.[232] Briefing on the country's foreign policy in 2004, a Pakistani senator[clarification needed] reportedly explained: "Pakistan highlights sovereign equality of states, bilateralism, mutuality of interests, and non-interference in each other's domestic affairs as the cardinal features of its foreign policy."[233] Pakistan is an active member of the United Nations and has a Permanent Representative to represent Pakistan's positions in international politics.[234] Pakistan has lobbied for the concept of "enlightened moderation" in the Muslim world.[235][236] Pakistan is also a member of Commonwealth of Nations,[237] the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO),[238][239] and the G20 developing nations.[240] Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan at the 2019 Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit Due to ideological differences, Pakistan opposed the Soviet Union in the 1950s. During the Soviet–Afghan War in the 1980s, Pakistan was one of the closest allies of the United States.[233][241] Relations between Pakistan and Russia have greatly improved since 1999, and co-operation in various sectors has increased.[242] Pakistan has had an "on-and-off" relationship with the United States. A close ally of the United States during the Cold war, Pakistan's relationship with the United States soured in the 1990s when the US imposed sanctions because of Pakistan's secretive nuclear development.[243] Since 9/11, Pakistan has been a close ally of the United States on the issue of counter-terrorism in the regions of the Middle East and South Asia, with the US supporting Pakistan with aid money and weapons.[244][245] Initially, the United States-led war on terrorism led to an improvement in the relationship, but it was strained by a divergence of interests and resulting mistrust during the war in Afghanistan and by issues related to terrorism.[246][247][248][249] Pakistan does not have diplomatic relations with Israel;[250] nonetheless, some Israeli citizens have visited the country on tourist visas.[251] However, an exchange took place between the two countries using Turkey as a communication conduit.[252] Despite Pakistan being the only country in the world that has not established diplomatic relations with Armenia, an Armenian community still resides in Pakistan.[253] Pakistan had warm relations with Bangladesh, despite some initial strains in their relationship. Relations with China Main article: China–Pakistan relations Pakistan Prime Minister Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai signing the Treaty of Friendship Between China and Pakistan. Pakistan is host to China's largest embassy.[254] Pakistan was one of the first countries to establish formal diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China, and the relationship continues to be strong since China's war with India in 1962, forming a special relationship.[255] From the 1960s to 1980s, Pakistan greatly helped China in reaching out to the world's major countries and helped facilitate US President Nixon's state visit to China.[255] Despite the change of governments in Pakistan and fluctuations in the regional and global situation, China's policy in Pakistan continues to be a dominant factor at all times.[255] In return, China is Pakistan's largest trading partner, and economic co-operation has flourished, with substantial Chinese investment in Pakistan's infrastructural expansion such as the Pakistani deep-water port at Gwadar. Friendly Sino-Pakistani relations reached new heights as both countries signed 51 agreements and Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) in 2015 for co-operation in different areas.[256][257][258][259] Both countries signed a Free Trade Agreement in the 2000s, and Pakistan continues to serve as China's communication bridge to the Muslim world.[260] In 2016, China announced that it will set up an anti-terrorism alliance with Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Tajikistan.[261] In December 2018, Pakistan's government defended China's re-education camps for a million Uyghur Muslims.[262][263] Emphasis on relations with Muslim world After Independence, Pakistan vigorously pursued bilateral relations with other Muslim countries[264] and made an active bid for leadership of the Muslim world, or at least for leadership in efforts to achieve unity.[265] The Ali brothers had sought to project Pakistan as the natural leader of the Islamic world, in part due to its large manpower and military strength.[266] A top-ranking Muslim League leader, Khaliquzzaman, declared that Pakistan would bring together all Muslim countries into Islamistan—a pan-Islamic entity.[267] Such developments (along with Pakistan's creation) did not get American approval, and British Prime Minister Clement Attlee voiced international opinion at the time by stating that he wished that India and Pakistan would re-unite.[268] Since most of the Arab world was undergoing a nationalist awakening at the time, there was little attraction to Pakistan's Pan-Islamic aspirations.[269] Some of the Arab countries saw the 'Islamistan' project as a Pakistani attempt to dominate other Muslim states.[270] Pakistan vigorously championed the right of self-determination for Muslims around the world. Pakistan's efforts for the independence movements of Indonesia, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, and Eritrea were significant and initially led to close ties between these countries and Pakistan.[271] However, Pakistan also masterminded an attack on the Afghan city of Jalalabad during the Afghan Civil War to establish an Islamic government there. Pakistan had wished to foment an 'Islamic Revolution' that would transcend national borders, covering Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia.[272] On the other hand, Pakistan's relations with Iran have been strained at times due to sectarian tensions.[273] Iran and Saudi Arabia used Pakistan as a battleground for their proxy sectarian war, and by the 1990s Pakistan's support for the Sunni Taliban organisation in Afghanistan became a problem for Shia Iran, which opposed a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.[274] Tensions between Iran and Pakistan intensified in 1998 when Iran accused Pakistan of war crimes after Pakistani warplanes had bombarded Afghanistan's last Shia stronghold in support of the Taliban.[275][276] Pakistan is an influential and founding member of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). Maintaining cultural, political, social, and economic relations with the Arab world and other countries in the Muslim world is a vital factor in Pakistan's foreign policy.[277] Administrative divisions Main articles: Administrative units of Pakistan and Districts of Pakistan Administrative division Capital Population  Balochistan Quetta 12,344,408  Punjab Lahore 110,126,285  Sindh Karachi 47,886,051  Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Peshawar 40,525,047  Gilgit-Baltistan Gilgit 1,800,000  Azad Kashmir Muzaffarabad 4,567,982 Islamabad Capital Territory Islamabad 2,851,868 A federal parliamentary republic state, Pakistan is a federation that comprises four provinces: Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh and Balochistan,[278] and three territories: Islamabad Capital Territory, Gilgit–Baltistan and Azad Kashmir. The Government of Pakistan exercises the de facto jurisdiction over the Frontier Regions and the western parts of the Kashmir Regions, which are organised into the separate political entities Azad Kashmir and Gilgit–Baltistan (formerly Northern Areas). In 2009, the constitutional assignment (the Gilgit–Baltistan Empowerment and Self-Governance Order) awarded the Gilgit–Baltistan a semi-provincial status, giving it self-government.[279] The local government system consists of a three-tier system of districts, tehsils, and union councils, with an elected body at each tier.[280] There are about 130 districts altogether, of which Azad Kashmir has ten[281] and Gilgit–Baltistan seven.[282] Clickable map of the four provinces and three federal territories of Pakistan. A clickable map of Pakistan exhibiting its administrative units. About this image Law enforcement is carried out by a joint network of the intelligence community with jurisdiction limited to the relevant province or territory. The National Intelligence Directorate coordinates the information intelligence at both federal and provincial levels; including the FIA, IB, Motorway Police, and paramilitary forces such as the Pakistan Rangers and the Frontier Corps.[283] Pakistan's "premier" intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), was formed just within a year after the Independence of Pakistan in 1947.[284] Pakistan's ISI was ranked as the top intelligence agency in the world in 2011 by the International Business Times UK.[285] ABC News Point in 2014 also reported that the ISI was ranked as the top intelligence agency in the world[286] while Zee News reported the ISI as ranking fifth among the world's most powerful intelligence agencies.[287] The court system is organised as a hierarchy, with the Supreme Court at the apex, below which are High Courts, Federal Shariat Courts (one in each province and one in the federal capital), District Courts (one in each district), Judicial Magistrate Courts (in every town and city), Executive Magistrate Courts, and civil courts. The Penal code has limited jurisdiction in the Tribal Areas, where law is largely derived from tribal customs.[283][288] Kashmir conflict Main article: Kashmir conflict The areas shown in green are the Pakistani-controlled areas. The Kashmir—the most northwesterly region of South Asia—is a major territorial dispute that has hindered relations between India and Pakistan. The two nations have fought at least three large-scale conventional wars in successive years in 1947, 1965, and 1971. The conflict in 1971 witnessed Pakistan's unconditional surrender and a treaty that subsequently led to the independence of Bangladesh.[289] Other serious military engagements and skirmishes have included the armed contacts in Siachen Glacier (1984) and Kargil (1999).[225] Approximately 45.1% of the Kashmir region is controlled by India, which also claims the entire state of Jammu and Kashmir, including most of Jammu, the Kashmir Valley, Ladakh, and the Siachen.[225] The claim is contested by Pakistan, which controls approximately 38.2% of the Kashmir region, an area known as the Azad Kashmir and Gilgit–Baltistan.[225][290] Azad Kashmir is part of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir. India claims the Kashmir on the basis of the Instrument of Accession—a legal agreement with Kashmir's leaders executed by Maharaja Hari Singh, who agreed to cede the area to India.[291] Pakistan claims Kashmir on the basis of a Muslim majority and of geography, the same principles that were applied for the creation of the two independent states.[292][293] India referred the dispute to the United Nations on 1 January 1948.[294] In a resolution passed in 1948, the UN's General Assembly asked Pakistan to remove most of its troops as a plebiscite would then be held. However, Pakistan failed to vacate the region and a ceasefire was reached in 1949 establishing a Line of Control (LoC) that divided Kashmir between the two nations.[295] India, fearful that the Muslim majority populace of Kashmir would secede from India, did not allow a plebiscite to take place in the region. This was confirmed in a statement by India's Defense Minister, Krishna Menon, who said: "Kashmir would vote to join Pakistan and no Indian Government responsible for agreeing to plebiscite would survive."[296] Pakistan claims that its position is for the right of the people of Jammu and Kashmir to determine their future through impartial elections as mandated by the United Nations,[297] while India has stated that Kashmir is an integral part of India, referring to the Simla Agreement (1972) and to the fact that elections take place regularly.[298] In recent developments, certain Kashmiri independence groups believe that Kashmir should be independent of both India and Pakistan.[225] Law enforcement Main articles: Law enforcement in Pakistan, Pakistan Intelligence Community, and National Intelligence Directorate (Pakistan) The law enforcement in Pakistan is carried out by joint network of several federal and provincial police agencies. The four provinces and the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) each have a civilian police force with jurisdiction extending only to the relevant province or territory.[192] At the federal level, there are a number of civilian intelligence agencies with nationwide jurisdictions including the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), Intelligence Bureau (IB), and the Motorway Patrol, as well as several paramilitary forces such as the National Guards (Northern Areas), the Rangers (Punjab and Sindh), and the Frontier Corps (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan). The most senior officers of all the civilian police forces also form part of the Police Service, which is a component of the civil service of Pakistan. Namely, there is four provincial police service including the Punjab Police, Sindh Police, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Police, and the Balochistan Police; all headed by the appointed senior Inspector-Generals. The ICT has its own police component, the Capital Police, to maintain law and order in the capital. The CID bureaus are the crime investigation unit and form a vital part in each provincial police service. The law enforcement in Pakistan also has a Motorway Patrol which is responsible for enforcement of traffic and safety laws, security and recovery on Pakistan's inter-provincial motorway network. In each of provincial Police Service, it also maintains a respective Elite Police units led by the NACTA—a counter-terrorism police unit as well as providing VIP escorts. In the Punjab and Sindh, the Pakistan Rangers are an internal security force with the prime objective to provide and maintain security in war zones and areas of conflict as well as maintaining law and order which includes providing assistance to the police.[299] The Frontier Corps serves the similar purpose in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, and the Balochistan.[299] Human rights Main articles: Human rights in Pakistan and LGBT rights in Pakistan Male homosexuality is illegal in Pakistan and punishable with up to life in prison.[300][301] In its 2018 Press Freedom Index, Reporters without borders ranked Pakistan number 139 out of 180 countries based on freedom of the press.[302] TV stations and news papers are routinely shut down for publishing any reports critical of the government or the military.[303][304][305] Military Main article: Pakistan Armed Forces Pakistan Air Force's JF-17 Thunder flying in front of the 26,660-foot-high (8,130-metre) Nanga Parbat. The armed forces of Pakistan are the eighth largest in the world in terms of numbers in full-time service, with about 617,000 personnel on active duty and 513,000 reservists, as of tentative estimates in 2010.[306] They came into existence after independence in 1947, and the military establishment has frequently influenced the national politics ever since.[216] Chain of command of the military is kept under the control of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee; all of the branches joint works, co-ordination, military logistics, and joint missions are under the Joint Staff HQ.[307] The Joint Staff HQ is composed of the Air HQ, Navy HQ, and Army GHQ in the vicinity of the Rawalpindi Military District.[308] The Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee is the highest principle staff officer in the armed forces, and the chief military adviser to the civilian government though the chairman has no authority over the three branches of armed forces.[307] The Chairman joint chiefs controls the military from the JS HQ and maintains strategic communications between the military and the civilian government.[307] As of 2018, the CJCSC is General Zubair Hayat alongside chief of army staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa,[309] chief of naval staff Admiral Muhammad Zaka,[310] and chief of air staff Air Chief Marshal Mujahid Anwar Khan.[311] The main branches are the Army–Air Force–Navy–Marines, which are supported by the number of paramilitary forces in the country.[312] Control over the strategic arsenals, deployment, employment, development, military computers and command and control is a responsibility vested under the National Command Authority which oversaw the work on the nuclear policy as part of the credible minimum deterrence.[148] The United States, Turkey, and China maintain close military relations and regularly export military equipment and technology transfer to Pakistan.[313] Joint logistics and major war games are occasionally carried out by the militaries of China and Turkey.[312][314][315] Philosophical basis for the military draft is introduced by the Constitution in times of emergency, but it has never been imposed.[316] Military history Since 1947 Pakistan has been involved in four conventional wars, the first war occurred in Kashmir with Pakistan gaining control of Western Kashmir, (Azad Kashmir and Gilgit–Baltistan), and India retaining Eastern Kashmir (Jammu and Kashmir). Territorial problems eventually led to another conventional war in 1965; over the issue of Bengali refugees that led to another war in 1971 which resulted in Pakistan's unconditional surrender in East Pakistan.[317] Tensions in Kargil brought the two countries at the brink of war.[149] Since 1947 the unresolved territorial problems with Afghanistan saw border skirmishes which were kept mostly at the mountainous border. In 1961, the military and intelligence community repelled the Afghan incursion in the Bajaur Agency near the Durand Line border.[318][319] Rising tensions with neighbouring USSR in their involvement in Afghanistan, Pakistani intelligence community, mostly the ISI, systematically coordinated the US resources to the Afghan mujahideen and foreign fighters against the Soviet Union's presence in the region. Military reports indicated that the PAF was in engagement with the Soviet Air Force, supported by the Afghan Air Force during the course of the conflict;[320] one of which belonged to Alexander Rutskoy.[320] Apart from its own conflicts, Pakistan has been an active participant in United Nations peacekeeping missions. It played a major role in rescuing trapped American soldiers from Mogadishu, Somalia, in 1993 in Operation Gothic Serpent.[321][322][323] According to UN reports, the Pakistani military is the third largest troop contributor to UN peacekeeping missions after Ethiopia and India.[324][325] Pakistan has deployed its military in some Arab countries, providing defence, training, and playing advisory roles.[326][327] The PAF and Navy's fighter pilots have voluntarily served in Arab nations' militaries against Israel in the Six-Day War (1967) and in the Yom Kippur War (1973). Pakistan's fighter pilots shot down ten Israeli planes in the Six-Day War.[321] In the 1973 war one of the PAF pilots, Flt. Lt. Sattar Alvi (flying a MiG-21), shot down an Israeli Air Force Mirage and was honoured by the Syrian government.[328][329][330] Requested by the Saudi monarchy in 1979, Pakistan's special forces units, operatives, and commandos were rushed to assist Saudi forces in Mecca to lead the operation of the Grand Mosque. For almost two weeks Saudi Special Forces and Pakistani commandos fought the insurgents who had occupied the Grand Mosque's compound.[331][332][333] In 1991 Pakistan got involved with the Gulf War and sent 5,000 troops as part of a US-led coalition, specifically for the defence of Saudi Arabia.[334] Despite the UN arms embargo on Bosnia, General Javed Nasir of the ISI airlifted anti-tank weapons and missiles to Bosnian mujahideen which turned the tide in favour of Bosnian Muslims and forced the Serbs to lift the siege. Under Nasir's leadership the ISI was also involved in supporting Chinese Muslims in Xinjiang Province, rebel Muslim groups in the Philippines, and some religious groups in Central Asia.[335][336] Since 2004 the military has been engaged in a war in North-West Pakistan, mainly against the homegrown Taliban factions.[337][338] Major operations undertaken by the army include Operation Black Thunderstorm, Operation Rah-e-Nijat and Operation Zarb-e-Azb.[339][340] According to SIPRI, Pakistan was the 9th largest recipient and importer of arms between 2012–2016.[341] Economy Ambox current red.svg This section needs to be updated. Please update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (April 2020) Main articles: Economy of Pakistan and Economic history of Pakistan See also: Pakistan and the International Monetary Fund Economic indicators GDP (PPP) $1.254 trillion (2019) [10] GDP (nominal) $284.2 billion (2019) [342] Real GDP growth 3.29% (2019) [343] CPI inflation 10.3% (2019) [344] Unemployment 5.7% (2018) [345] Labor force participation rate 48.9% (2018) [346] Total public debt $106 billion (2019) National wealth $465 billion (2019) [347] Economy of Pakistan is the 23rd largest in the world in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP), and 42nd largest in terms of nominal gross domestic product. Economists estimate that Pakistan was part of the wealthiest region of the world throughout the first millennium CE, with the largest economy by GDP. This advantage was lost in the 18th century as other regions such as China and Western Europe edged forward.[348] Pakistan is considered a developing country[349][350] and is one of the Next Eleven, a group of eleven countries that, along with the BRICs, have a high potential to become the world's largest economies in the 21st century.[351] In recent years, after decades of social instability, as of 2013, serious deficiencies in macromanagement and unbalanced macroeconomics in basic services such as rail transportation and electrical energy generation have developed.[352] The economy is considered to be semi-industrialized, with centres of growth along the Indus River.[353][354][355] The diversified economies of Karachi and Punjab's urban centres coexist with less-developed areas in other parts of the country, particularly in Balochistan.[354] According to the Economic complexity index, Pakistan is the 67th-largest export economy in the world and the 106th most complex economy.[356] During the fiscal year 2015–16, Pakistan's exports stood at US$20.81 billion and imports at US$44.76 billion, resulting in a negative trade balance of US$23.96 billion.[357] The Pakistan Stock Exchange is one of the worst-performing markets in the world. According to Bloomberg, in the two years before 2019 Pakistan stocks have erased more than half of their combined market value.[358] As of 2019, Pakistan's estimated nominal GDP is US$284.2 billion.[10] The GDP by PPP is US$1.254 trillion.[10] The estimated nominal per capita GDP is US$1,388,[10] the GDP (PPP)/capita is US$6,016 (international dollars),[10] According to the World Bank, Pakistan has important strategic endowments and development potential. The increasing proportion of Pakistan's youth provides the country with both a potential demographic dividend and a challenge to provide adequate services and employment.[359] 21.04% of the population live below the international poverty line of US$1.25 a day. The unemployment rate among the aged 15 and over population is 5.5%.[360] Pakistan has an estimated 40 million middle class citizens, projected to increase to 100 million by 2050.[361] A 2015 report published by the World Bank ranked Pakistan's economy at 24th-largest[362] in the world by purchasing power and 41st-largest[363] in absolute terms. It is South Asia's second-largest economy, representing about 15.0% of regional GDP.[364][365] Fiscal Year GDP growth[366] Inflation rate[367] 2013–14 Increase4.05% 108.6% 2014–15 Increase4.06% 104.5% 2015–16 Increase4.56% 102.9% 2016–17 Increase5.37% 104.2% 2017–18 Increase5.79% 103.8% Pakistan's economic growth since its inception has been varied. It has been slow during periods of democratic transition, but robust during the three periods of martial law, although the foundation for sustainable and equitable growth was not formed.[128] The early to middle 2000s was a period of rapid economic reforms; the government raised development spending, which reduced poverty levels by 10% and increased GDP by 3%.[192][368] The economy cooled again from 2007.[192] Inflation reached 25.0% in 2008,[369] and Pakistan had to depend on a fiscal policy backed by the International Monetary Fund to avoid possible bankruptcy.[370][371] A year later, the Asian Development Bank reported that Pakistan's economic crisis was easing.[372] The inflation rate for the fiscal year 2010–11 was 14.1%.[373] Since 2013, as part of an International Monetary Fund program, Pakistan's economic growth has picked up. In 2014 Goldman Sachs predicted that Pakistan's economy would grow 15 times in the next 35 years to become the 18th-largest economy in the world by 2050.[374] In his 2016 book, The Rise and Fall of Nations, Ruchir Sharma termed Pakistan's economy as at a 'take-off' stage and the future outlook until 2020 has been termed 'Very Good'. Sharma termed it possible to transform Pakistan from a "low-income to a middle-income country during the next five years".[375] Share of world GDP (PPP)[376] Year Share 1980 0.54% 1990 0.72% 2000 0.74% 2010 0.79% 2017 0.83% Pakistan is one of the largest producers of natural commodities, and its labour market is the 10th-largest in the world. The 7-million–strong Pakistani diaspora contributed US$19.9 billion to the economy in 2015–16.[377][378] The major source countries of remittances to Pakistan are: the UAE; the United States; Saudi Arabia; the Gulf states (Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, and Oman); Australia; Canada; Japan; the United Kingdom; Norway; and Switzerland.[379][380] According to the World Trade Organization, Pakistan's share of overall world exports is declining; it contributed only 0.13% in 2007.[381] Agriculture and primary sector Surface mining in Sindh. Pakistan has been termed the 'Saudi Arabia of Coal' by Forbes.[382] Main articles: Agriculture in Pakistan, Fuel extraction in Pakistan, and Mining in Pakistan The structure of the Pakistani economy has changed from a mainly agricultural to a strong service base. Agriculture as of 2015 accounts for only 20.9% of the GDP.[383] Even so, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Pakistan produced 21,591,400 metric tons of wheat in 2005, more than all of Africa (20,304,585 metric tons) and nearly as much as all of South America (24,557,784 metric tons).[384] Majority of the population, directly or indirectly, is dependent on this sector. It accounts for 43.5% of employed labour force and is the largest source of foreign exchange earnings.[383][385] A large portion of the country's manufactured exports is dependent on raw materials such as cotton and hides that are part of the agriculture sector, while supply shortages and market disruptions in farm products do push up inflationary pressures. The country is also the fifth-largest producer of cotton, with cotton production of 14 million bales from a modest beginning of 1.7 million bales in the early 1950s; is self-sufficient in sugarcane; and is the fourth-largest producer in the world of milk. Land and water resources have not risen proportionately, but the increases have taken place mainly due to gains in labour and agriculture productivity. The major breakthrough in crop production took place in the late 1960s and 1970s due to the Green Revolution that made a significant contribution to land and yield increases of wheat and rice. Private tube wells led to a 50 percent increase in the cropping intensity which was augmented by tractor cultivation. While the tube wells raised crop yields by 50 percent, the High Yielding Varieties (HYVs) of wheat and rice led to a 50–60 percent higher yield.[386] Meat industry accounts for 1.4 percent of overall GDP.[387] Industry Main article: Industry of Pakistan See also: Textile industry in Pakistan Television assembly factory in Lahore. Pakistan's industrial sector accounts for about 20.3% of the GDP, and is dominated by small and medium-sized enterprises.[388] Industry is the third-largest sector of the economy, accounting for 20.3% of gross domestic product (GDP), and 13 percent of total employment. Large-scale manufacturing (LSM), at 12.2% of GDP, dominates the overall sector, accounting for 66% of the sectoral share, followed by small-scale manufacturing, which accounts for 4.9% of total GDP. Pakistan's cement industry is also fast growing mainly because of demand from Afghanistan and from the domestic real estate sector. In 2013 Pakistan exported 7,708,557 metric tons of cement.[389] Pakistan has an installed capacity of 44,768,250 metric tons of cement and 42,636,428 metric tons of clinker. In 2012 and 2013, the cement industry in Pakistan became the most profitable sector of the economy.[390] The textile industry has a pivotal position in the manufacturing sector of Pakistan. In Asia, Pakistan is the eighth-largest exporter of textile products, contributing 9.5% to the GDP and providing employment to around 15 million people (some 30% of the 49 million people in the workforce). Pakistan is the fourth-largest producer of cotton with the third-largest spinning capacity in Asia after China and India, contributing 5% to the global spinning capacity.[391] China is the second largest buyer of Pakistani textiles, importing US$1.527 billion of textiles last fiscal. Unlike the US, where mostly value-added textiles are imported, China buys only cotton yarn and cotton fabric from Pakistan. In 2012, Pakistani textile products accounted for 3.3% or US$1.07bn of all UK textile imports, 12.4% or $4.61bn of total Chinese textile imports, 3.0% of all US textile imports ($2,980 million), 1.6% of total German textile imports ($880 million) and 0.7% of total Indian textile imports ($888 million).[392] Services Main articles: Real estate in Pakistan, Information technology in Pakistan, and Banking in Pakistan Rising skyline of Karachi with several under construction skyscrapers.   Lucky One Mall, Karachi is the largest shopping mall in Pakistan as well as in South Asia with an area of about 3.4 million square feet.[393][394][395]   At a height of 300 metres (980 ft), Bahria Icon Tower, Karachi is the tallest skyscraper in Pakistan and the second-tallest in South Asia. Services sector has 58.8% share in GDP[383] and has emerged as the main driver of economic growth.[396] Pakistani society like other developing countries is a consumption oriented society, having a high marginal propensity to consume. The growth rate of services sector is higher than the growth rate of agriculture and industrial sector. Services sector accounts for 54 percent of GDP in 2014 and little over one-third of total employment. Services sector has strong linkages with other sectors of economy; it provides essential inputs to agriculture sector and manufacturing sector.[397] Pakistan's I.T sector is regarded as among the fastest growing sector's in Pakistan. The World Economic Forum, assessing the development of Information and Communication Technology in the country ranked Pakistan 110th among 139 countries on the 'Networked Readiness Index 2016'.[398] As of May 2020, Pakistan has about 82 million internet users, making it the 9th-largest population of Internet users in the world.[399][400] The current growth rate and employment trend indicate that Pakistan's Information Communication Technology (ICT) industry will exceed the $10-billion mark by 2020.[401] The sector employees 12,000 and count's among top five freelancing nations.[402][403] The country has also improved its export performance in telecom, computer and information services, as the share of their exports surged from 8.2pc in 2005–06 to 12.6pc in 2012–13. This growth is much better than that of China, whose share in services exports was 3pc and 7.7pc for the same period respectively.[404] Tourism Main article: Tourism in Pakistan Lake Saiful Muluk, located at the northern end of the Kaghan Valley, near the town of Naran in the Saiful Muluk National Park.   Badshahi Mosque was commissioned by the Mughals in 1671. It is listed as a World Heritage Site.   The 7,788 metres (25,551 ft) tall Rakaposhi mountain towers over Hunza   Shangrila Lake with adjoining Shangrila Resort, Skardu, Gilgit-Baltistan   Fairy Meadows and the view of Nanga Parbat   Attabad Lake, Hunza Valley   The Deosai Plains are the world's second highest alpine plain.   Hawke's Bay Beach, Karachi   Minar-e-Pakistan, Lahore   K2, the second-highest mountain on Earth With its diverse cultures, people, and landscapes, Pakistan attracted around 6.6 million foreign tourists in 2018,[405] which represented a significant decline since the 1970s when the country received unprecedented numbers of foreign tourists due to the popular Hippie trail. The trail attracted thousands of Europeans and Americans in the 1960s and 1970s who travelled via land through Turkey and Iran into India through Pakistan.[406] The main destinations of choice for these tourists were the Khyber Pass, Peshawar, Karachi, Lahore, Swat and Rawalpindi.[407] The numbers following the trail declined after the Iranian Revolution and the Soviet–Afghan War.[408] Pakistan's tourist attractions range from the mangroves in the south to the Himalayan hill stations in the north-east. The country's tourist destinations range from the Buddhist ruins of Takht-i-Bahi and Taxila, to the 5,000-year-old cities of the Indus Valley Civilization such as Mohenjo-daro and Harappa.[409] Pakistan is home to several mountain peaks over 7,000 metres (23,000 feet).[410] The northern part of Pakistan has many old fortresses, examples of ancient architecture, and the Hunza and Chitral valleys, home to the small pre-Islamic Kalasha community claiming descent from Alexander the Great.[411] Pakistan's cultural capital, Lahore, contains many examples of Mughal architecture such as the Badshahi Masjid, the Shalimar Gardens, the Tomb of Jahangir, and the Lahore Fort. In October 2006, just one year after the 2005 Kashmir earthquake, The Guardian released what it described as "The top five tourist sites in Pakistan" in order to help the country's tourism industry.[412] The five sites included Taxila, Lahore, the Karakoram Highway, Karimabad, and Lake Saiful Muluk. To promote Pakistan's unique cultural heritage, the government organizes various festivals throughout the year.[413] In 2015 the World Economic Forum's Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report ranked Pakistan 125 out of 141 countries.[414] Infrastructure See also: Water supply and sanitation in Pakistan Nuclear power and energy Main articles: Nuclear power in Pakistan, Energy in Pakistan, and Electricity sector in Pakistan Tarbela Dam, the largest earth filled dam in the world, was constructed in 1968. By the end of 2016, nuclear power was provided by four licensed commercial nuclear power plants.[415] The Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) is solely responsible for operating these power plants, while the Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority regulates safe usage of the nuclear energy.[416] The electricity generated by commercial nuclear power plants constitutes roughly 5.8% of Pakistan's electrical energy, compared to 64.2% from fossil fuels (crude oil and natural gas), 29.9% from hydroelectric power, and 0.1% from coal.[417][418][419] Pakistan is one of the four nuclear armed states (along with India, Israel, and North Korea) that is not a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, but it is a member in good standing of the International Atomic Energy Agency.[420][421][422] The KANUPP-I, a Candu-type nuclear reactor, was supplied by Canada in 1971—the country's first commercial nuclear power plant. The Sino-Pakistani nuclear cooperation began in the early 1980s. After a Sino-Pakistani nuclear cooperation agreement in 1986,[423] China provided Pakistan with a nuclear reactor dubbed CHASNUPP-I for energy and industrial growth of the country. In 2005 both countries proposed working on a joint energy security plan, calling for a huge increase in generation capacity to more than 160,000 MWe by 2030. Under its Nuclear Energy Vision 2050, the Pakistani government plans to increase nuclear power generation capacity to 40,000 MWe,[424] 8,900 MWe of it by 2030.[425][426] Pakistan produced 1,135 megawatts of renewable energy for the month of October 2016. Pakistan expects to produce 3,000 megawatts of renewable energy by the beginning of 2019.[427] In June 2008 the nuclear commercial complex was expanded with the ground work of installing and operationalising the Chashma-III and Chashma–IV reactors at Chashma, Punjab Province, each with 325–340 MWe and costing ₨ 129 billion; from which the ₨ 80 billion came from international sources, principally China. A further agreement for China's help with the project was signed in October 2008, and given prominence as a counter to the US–India agreement that shortly preceded it. The cost quoted then was US$1.7 billion, with a foreign loan component of US$1.07 billion. In 2013 Pakistan established a second commercial nuclear complex in Karachi with plans of additional reactors, similar to the one in Chashma.[428] The electrical energy is generated by various energy corporations and evenly distributed by the National Electric Power Regulatory Authority (NEPRA) among the four provinces. However, the Karachi-based K-Electric and the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) generates much of the electrical energy used in Pakistan in addition to gathering revenue nationwide.[429] As of 2014, Pakistan has an installed electricity generation capacity of ~22,797MWt.[417] Transport Main article: Transport in Pakistan The transport industry accounts for ~10.5% of the nation's GDP.[430] Motorways Main article: Motorways of Pakistan The motorway passes through the Salt Range mountains Pakistan's motorway infrastructure is best in South Asia[431] (better than those of India and Bangladesh) and one of the best motorway infrastructure in the world.[432][433] Motorways of Pakistan are a network of multiple-lane, high-speed, controlled-access highways in Pakistan, which are owned, maintained, and operated federally by Pakistan's National Highway Authority. As of 20 February 2020, 1882 km of motorways are operational, while an additional 1854 km are under construction or planned. All motorways in Pakistan are pre-fixed with the letter 'M' (for "Motorway") followed by the unique numerical designation of the specific highway (with a hyphen in the middle), e.g. "M-1".[434] Pakistan's motorways are an important part of Pakistan's "National Trade Corridor Project",[435] which aims to link Pakistan's three Arabian Sea ports (Karachi Port, Port Bin Qasim and Gwadar Port) to the rest of the country through its national highways and motorways network and further north with Afghanistan, Central Asia and China. The project was planned in 1990. The China Pakistan Economic Corridor project aims to link Gwadar Port and Kashgar (China) using Pakistani motorways, national highways, and expressways. Highways See also: National Highways of Pakistan Highways form the backbone of Pakistan's transport system; a total road length of 263,942 kilometres (164,006 miles) accounts for 92% of passengers and 96% of inland freight traffic.[383] Road transport services are largely in the hands of the private sector. The National Highway Authority is responsible for the maintenance of national highways and motorways. The highway and motorway system depends mainly on north–south links connecting the southern ports to the populous provinces of Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Although this network only accounts for 4.6% of total road length,[383] it carries 85% of the country's traffic.[436][437] Railways Karachi Cantonment railway station   Sahiwal railway station   Khyber Express at Shahgai station The Pakistan Railways, under the Ministry of Railways (MoR), operates the railroad system. From 1947 until the 1970s the train system was the primary means of transport until the nationwide constructions of the national highways and the economic boom of the automotive industry. Beginning in the 1990s there was a marked shift in traffic from rail to highways; dependence grew on roads after the introduction of vehicles in the country. Now the railway's share of inland traffic is below 8% for passengers and 4% for freight traffic.[383] As personal transportation began to be dominated by the automobile, total rail track decreased from 8,775 kilometres (5,453 miles) in 1990–91 to 7,791 kilometres (4,841 miles) in 2011.[436][438] Pakistan expects to use the rail service to boost foreign trade with China, Iran, and Turkey.[439][440] Airports Main article: List of airports in Pakistan Islamabad International Airport has a capacity of handling 18 million passengers annually.   Terminal of Islamabad International Airport   Boeing 737 owned and operated by Pakistan International Airlines (PIA). PIA operates scheduled services to 70 domestic destinations and 34 international destinations in 27 countries. There are an estimated 139 airports and airfields in Pakistan—including both the military and the mostly publicly owned civilian airports. Although Jinnah International Airport is the principal international gateway to Pakistan, the international airports in Lahore, Islamabad, Peshawar, Quetta, Faisalabad, Sialkot, and Multan also handle significant amounts of traffic. The civil aviation industry is mixed with public and private sectors, which was deregulated in 1993. While the state-owned Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) is the major and dominant air carrier that carries about 73% of domestic passengers and all domestic freight, the private airlines such as airBlue and Air Indus, also provide similar services at a low cost. Seaports Port of Karachi is one of South Asia's largest and busiest deep-water seaports, handling about 60% of the nation's cargo (25 million tons per annum).   Gwadar Port is the deepest sea port of the world.[441]   Located in the city of Karachi, Port Qasim is Pakistan's second busiest sea port, handling about 30% of the nation's cargo (14 million tons per annum). Major seaports are in Karachi, Sindh (the Karachi port, Port Qasim).[436][438] Since the 1990s some seaport operations have been moved to Balochistan with the construction of Gwadar Port, Port of Pasni and Gadani Port.[436][438] Gwadar Port is the deepest sea port of the world.[441] According to the WEF's Global Competitiveness Report, quality ratings of Pakistan's port infrastructure increased from 3.7 to 4.1 between 2007 and 2016.[442] Metro Main article: List of rapid transit systems in Pakistan Track of Islamabad-Rawalpindi Metrobus with adjoining station The Orange Line Metro Train is an automated rapid transit system in Lahore.[443][444] The Orange line is the first of the three proposed rail lines proposed for the Lahore Metro. The line spans 27.1 km (16.8 mi) with 25.4 km (15.8 mi) elevated and 1.72 km (1.1 mi) underground and have a cost of 251.06 billion Rupees ($1.6 billion).[445] The line consists of 26 subway stations and is designed to carry over 250,000 passengers daily. Karachi Circular Railway is a rapid transit that was started in 1969 and closed in 1999.[446] A tramway service was started in 1884 in Karachi but was closed in 1975 because of some reasons.[447][448] In March 2020, Minister of Railways Sheikh Rasheed Ahmed said that the Karachi Circular Railway "will be operationalized in six months" in collaboration with the government of Sindh.[449] Rawalpindi-Islamabad Metrobus is a 22.5 km (14.0 mi) bus rapid transit system operating in the Islamabad Rawalpindi metropolitan area. The Metrobus network’s first phase was opened on June 4, 2015, and stretches 22 kilometres between Pak Secretariat, in Islamabad, and Saddar in Rawalpindi. The system uses e-ticketing and an Intelligent Transportation System and is managed by the Punjab Mass Transit Authority. Lahore Metrobus is a bus rapid transit service operating in the city of Lahore.[450] The Metrobus network’s first phase was opened in February, 2013. Multan Metrobus is a bus rapid transit (BRT) system in Multan.[451] Construction on the line began in May 2015, while operations commenced on 24 January 2017.[452] Green Line Metrobus is a first phase of Karachi Metrobus that is under construction in Karachi. The Government of Pakistan is financing the majority of the project.[453] Construction of the Green Line began on February 26, 2016.[454] Peshawar Bus Rapid Transit (Peshawar BRT) is a bus rapid transit system currently under construction by the Peshawar Development Authority (PDA) in Peshawar, capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. The construction of the project was started in October 2017 and is expected to be operational by the end of 2020.[455] Faisalabad shuttle train service and Faisalabad Metrobus are the proposed rapid transit projects in the city of Faisalabad. These projects are the part of a mega-project of China–Pakistan Economic Corridor.[456][457] A tramway service service was started in 1884 in Karachi but was closed in 1975 because of some reasons.[458][459] Sindh Government is planning to restart the tramway services in the city by the collaboration of Austrian experts.[460] In October 2019, a project for the construction of tramway service in Lahore has also been signed by the Punjab Government. This project will be launched under public-private partnership in a joint venture of European and Chinese companies alongwith the Punjab transport department.[461] The Government of Pakistan has planned to start a Monorail system in the federal capital Islamabad.[462] Flyovers and Underpasses Main article: List of flyovers in Pakistan Nagan Chowrangi Flyover, Karachi   Azadi Chowk Flyover, Lahore   Sufi Barkat Ali Flyover and Underpass, Faisalabad Many flyovers and underpasses are located in major urban areas of the country to regulate the flow of traffic. The highest number of flyovers and under passes are located in Karachi, followed by Lahore.[463][464] Other cities having flyovers and underpasses for the regulation of flow of traffic includes Islamabad-Rawalpindi, Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Multan, Peshawar, Hyderabad, Quetta, Sargodha, Bahawalpur, Sukkur, Larkana, Rahim Yar Khan and Sahiwal etc.[465][466][467][468][469] Beijing Underpass, Lahore is the longest underpass of Pakistan with a length of about 1.3 km (0.81 mi).[470] Muslim Town Flyover, Lahore is the longest flyover of the country with a length of about 2.6 km (1.6 mi).[471] Science and technology Main articles: Science and technology in Pakistan and List of Pakistani inventions and discoveries Abdus Salam won the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics for his contribution to electroweak interaction. He was the first Muslim to win a Nobel prize in science. Atta-ur-Rahman won the UNESCO Science Prize for pioneering contributions in chemistry in 1999, the first Muslim to win it. Mahbub ul Haq was a Pakistani game theorist whose work led to the Human Development Index. He had a profound effect on the field of international development. Developments in science and technology have played an important role in Pakistan's infrastructure and helped the country connect to the rest of the world.[472] Every year, scientists from around the world are invited by the Pakistan Academy of Sciences and the Pakistan Government to participate in the International Nathiagali Summer College on Physics.[473] Pakistan hosted an international seminar on "Physics in Developing Countries" for the International Year of Physics 2005.[474] Pakistani theoretical physicist Abdus Salam won a Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on the electroweak interaction.[475] Influential publications and critical scientific work in the advancement of mathematics, biology, economics, computer science, and genetics have been produced by Pakistani scientists at both the domestic and international levels.[476] In chemistry, Salimuzzaman Siddiqui was the first Pakistani scientist to bring the therapeutic constituents of the neem tree to the attention of natural products chemists.[477][478][479] Pakistani neurosurgeon Ayub Ommaya invented the Ommaya reservoir, a system for treatment of brain tumours and other brain conditions.[480] Scientific research and development play a pivotal role in Pakistani universities, government- sponsored national laboratories, science parks, and the industry.[481] Abdul Qadeer Khan, regarded as the founder of the HEU-based gas-centrifuge uranium enrichment program for Pakistan's integrated atomic bomb project.[482] He founded and established the Kahuta Research Laboratories (KRL) in 1976, serving as both its senior scientist and the Director-General until his retirement in 2001, and he was an early and vital figure in other science projects. Apart from participating in Pakistan's atomic bomb project, he made major contributions in molecular morphology, physical martensite, and its integrated applications in condensed and material physics.[483][484] In 2010 Pakistan was ranked 43rd in the world in terms of published scientific papers.[485] The Pakistan Academy of Sciences, a strong scientific community, plays an influential and vital role in formulating recommendations regarding science policies for the government.[486] The 1960s saw the emergence of an active space program led by SUPARCO that produced advances in domestic rocketry, electronics, and aeronomy.[487] The space program recorded a few notable feats and achievements. The successful launch of its first rocket into space made Pakistan the first South Asian country to have achieved such a task.[487] Successfully producing and launching the nation's first space satellite in 1990, Pakistan became the first Muslim country and second South Asian country to put a satellite into space.[488][489] Pakistan witnessed a fourfold increase in its scientific productivity in the past decade surging from approximately 2,000 articles per year in 2006 to more than 9,000 articles in 2015. Making Pakistan's cited article's higher than the BRIC countries put together. —Thomson Reuters's Another BRIC in the Wall 2016 report[490] As an aftermath of the 1971 war with India, the clandestine crash program developed atomic weapons partly motivated by fear and to prevent any foreign intervention, while ushering in the atomic age in the post cold war era.[230] Competition with India and tensions eventually led to Pakistan's decision to conduct underground nuclear tests in 1998, thus becoming the seventh country in the world to successfully develop nuclear weapons.[491] Pakistan is the first and only Muslim country that maintains an active research presence in Antarctica.[492][493][494][495][496] Since 1991 Pakistan has maintained two summer research stations and one weather observatory on the continent and plans to open another full-fledged permanent base in Antarctica.[497] Energy consumption by computers and usage has grown since the 1990s when PCs were introduced; Pakistan has about 82 million Internet users and is ranked as one of the top countries that have registered a high growth rate in Internet penetration as of 2020.[399] Key publications have been produced by Pakistan, and domestic software development has gained considerable international praise.[498] As of May 2020, Pakistan has about 82 million internet users, making it the 9th-largest population of Internet users in the world.[399][499] Since the 2000s Pakistan has made a significant amount of progress in supercomputing, and various institutions offer research opportunities in parallel computing. The Pakistan government reportedly spends ₨ 4.6 billion on information technology projects, with emphasis on e-government, human resources, and infrastructure development.[500] Education Main articles: Education in Pakistan, Higher Education Commission (Pakistan), and Rankings of universities in Pakistan Government College University is one of the oldest universities in Pakistan as well as one of the oldest institutions of higher learning in the Muslim world. National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) is Pakistan's top ranked university for engineering, sciences and technology. The constitution of Pakistan requires the state to provide free primary and secondary education.[501][502] Central Library of University of Sargodha At the time of the establishment of Pakistan as a state, the country had only one university, Punjab University in Lahore.[503] Very soon the Pakistan government established public universities in each of the four provinces, including Sindh University (1949), Peshawar University (1950), Karachi University (1953), and Balochistan University (1970). Pakistan has a large network of both public and private universities, which includes collaboration between the universities aimed at providing research and higher education opportunities in the country, although there is concern about the low quality of teaching in many of the newer schools.[504] It is estimated that there are 3,193 technical and vocational institutions in Pakistan,[505] and there are also madrassahs that provide free Islamic education and offer free board and lodging to students, who come mainly from the poorer strata of society.[506] Strong public pressure and popular criticism over extremists' usage of madrassahs for recruitment, the Pakistan government has made repeated efforts to regulate and monitor the quality of education in the madrassahs.[507][508] Literacy rate in Pakistan 1951–2018 Education in Pakistan is divided into six main levels: nursery (preparatory classes); primary (grades one through five); middle (grades six through eight); matriculation (grades nine and ten, leading to the secondary certificate); intermediate (grades eleven and twelve, leading to a higher secondary certificate); and university programmes leading to graduate and postgraduate degrees.[505] There is a network of private schools that constitutes a parallel secondary education system based on a curriculum set and administered by the Cambridge International Examinations of the United Kingdom. Some students choose to take the O-level and A level exams conducted by the British Council.[509] According to the International Schools Consultancy, Pakistan has 439 international schools.[510] Malala Yousafzai at the Women of the World festival in 2014. As a result of initiatives taken in 2007, the English medium education has been made compulsory in all schools across the country.[511][512] In 2012, Malala Yousafzai, a campaigner for female education, was shot by a Taliban gunman in retaliation for her activism.[513] Yousafzai went on to become the youngest ever Nobel laureate for her global education-related advocacy.[514] Additional reforms enacted in 2013 required all educational institutions in Sindh to begin offering Chinese language courses, reflecting China's growing role as a superpower and its increasing influence in Pakistan.[515] The literacy rate of the population is 62.3% as of 2018.[516] The rate of male literacy is 72.5% while the rate of female literacy is 51.8%.[516] Literacy rates vary by region and particularly by sex; as one example, tribal areas female literacy is 9.5%,[517] while Azad Jammu & Kashmir has a literacy rate of 74%.[518] With the advent of computer literacy in 1995, the government launched a nationwide initiative in 1998 with the aim of eradicating illiteracy and providing a basic education to all children.[519] Through various educational reforms, by 2015 the Ministry of Education expected to attain 100% enrollment levels among children of primary school age and a literacy rate of ~86% among people aged over 10.[520] Pakistan is currently spending 2.2 percent of its GDP on education;[521] which according to the Institute of Social and Policy Sciences is one of the lowest in South Asia.[522] Demographics Main articles: Demographics of Pakistan, Demographic history of Pakistan, Ethnic groups in Pakistan, and Pakistanis Map showing population density in Pakistan, per 2017 census.[523] According to provisional results of 2017 Census of Pakistan, the total population in Pakistan was 207.8 million, representing a 57% increase in 19 years.[524][525][526] which is equivalent to 2.6% of the world population.[527] Pakistan's census provisional results exclude data from Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir, which is likely to be included in the final report.[528] Noted as the fifth most populated country in the world, its growth rate in 2016 was reported to be 1.45%, which is the highest of the SAARC nations, though this growth rate has been decreasing in recent years.[529] The population is projected to reach 210.13 million by 2020. At the time of the partition in 1947, Pakistan had a population of 32.5 million;[380][530] the population increased by ~57.2% between the years 1990 and 2009.[531] By 2030 Pakistan is expected to surpass Indonesia as the largest Muslim-majority country in the world.[532][533] Pakistan is classified as a "young nation", with a median age of 23.4 in 2016;[529] about 104 million people were under the age of 30 in 2010. In 2016 Pakistan's fertility rate was estimated to be 2.68,[529] higher than its neighbour India (2.45).[534] Around 35% of the people are under 15.[380] The vast majority of those residing in southern Pakistan live along the Indus River, with Karachi being the most populous commercial city in the south.[535] In eastern, western, and northern Pakistan, most of the population lives in an arc formed by the cities of Lahore, Faisalabad, Rawalpindi, Sargodha, Islamabad, Gujranwala, Sialkot, Gujrat, Jhelum, Sheikhupura, Nowshera, Mardan, and Peshawar.[192] During 1990–2008, city dwellers made up 36% of Pakistan's population, making it the most urbanised nation in South Asia, which increased to 38% by 2013.[192][380][536] Furthermore, 50% of Pakistanis live in towns of 5,000 people or more.[537] Expenditure on healthcare was ~2.8% of GDP in 2013. Life expectancy at birth was 67 years for females and 65 years for males in 2013.[536] The private sector accounts for about 80% of outpatient visits. Approximately 19% of the population and 30% of children under five are malnourished.[355] Mortality of the under-fives was 86 per 1,000 live births in 2012.[536] Languages First languages of Pakistan[538] Punjabi   38.78% Pashto   18.24% Sindhi   14.57% Saraiki   12.19% Urdu   7.08% Balochi   3.02% others   6.12% Main article: Languages of Pakistan More than sixty languages are spoken in Pakistan, including a number of provincial languages. Urdu—the lingua franca and a symbol of Muslim identity and national unity—is the national language understood by over 75% of Pakistanis. It is the main medium of communication in the country but the primary language of only 7% of Pakistan's population.[538][539][540] Urdu and English are the official languages of Pakistan, with English primarily used in official business and government, and in legal contracts;[192] the local variety is known as Pakistani English. The Punjabi language, the most common in Pakistan and the first language of 38.78% of Pakistan's population,[538] is mostly spoken in the Punjab. Saraiki, mainly spoken in South Punjab and Hindko, is predominant in the Hazara region of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Pashto is the provincial language of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The Sindhi language is commonly spoken in Sindh while the Balochi language is dominant in Balochistan. Brahui, a Dravidian language, is spoken by the Brahui people who live in Balochistan.[541][542] There are also speakers of Gujarati in Karachi.[543] Marwari, a Rajasthani language, is also spoken in parts of Sindh. Various languages such as Shina, Balti, and Burushaski are spoken in Gilgit-Baltistan, whilst languages such as Pahari, Gojri, and Kashmiri are spoken by many in Azad Kashmir. The Arabic language is officially recognised by the constitution of Pakistan. It declares in article 31 No. 2 that "The State shall endeavour, as respects the Muslims of Pakistan (a) to make the teaching of the Holy Quran and Islamiat compulsory, to encourage and facilitate the learning of Arabic language ..."[14] Immigration Main article: Immigration to Pakistan Pakistan hosts the second largest refugee population globally after Turkey.[544] An Afghan refugee girl near Tarbela Dam Even after partition in 1947, Indian Muslims continued to migrate to Pakistan throughout the 1950s and 1960s, and these migrants settled mainly in Karachi and other towns of Sindh province.[545] The wars in neighboring Afghanistan during the 1980s and 1990s also forced millions of Afghan refugees into Pakistan. The Pakistan Census excludes the 1.41 million registered refugees from Afghanistan,[546] who are found mainly in the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and tribal belt, with small numbers residing in Karachi and Quetta. Pakistan is home to one of the world's largest refugee populations.[547] In addition to Afghans, around 2 million Bangladeshis and half a million other undocumented people live in Pakistan. They are claimed to be from other areas such as Myanmar, Iran, Iraq, and Africa.[548] Experts say that the migration of both Bengalis and Burmese (Rohingya) to Pakistan started in the 1980s and continued until 1998. Shaikh Muhammad Feroze, the chairman of the Pakistani Bengali Action Committee, claims that there are 200 settlements of Bengali-speaking people in Pakistan, of which 132 are in Karachi. They are also found in various other areas of Pakistan such as Thatta, Badin, Hyderabad, Tando Adam, and Lahore.[549] Large-scale Rohingya migration to Karachi made that city one of the largest population centres of Rohingyas in the world after Myanmar.[550] The Burmese community of Karachi is spread out over 60 of the city's slums such as the Burmi Colony in Korangi, Arakanabad, Machchar colony, Bilal colony, Ziaul Haq Colony, and Godhra Camp.[551] Thousands of Uyghur Muslims have also migrated to the Gilgit-Baltistan region of Pakistan, fleeing religious and cultural persecution in Xinjiang, China.[552] Since 1989 thousands of Kashmiri Muslim refugees have sought refuge in Pakistan, complaining that many of the refugee women had been raped by Indian soldiers and that they were forced out of their homes by the soldiers.[553] Ethnic groups Ethnic groups in Pakistan[3] Punjabi   44.7% Pashtun (Pathan)   15.4% Sindhi   14.1% Saraiki   8.4% Muhajir   7.6% Baloch   3.6% others   6.3% The major ethnic groups are Punjabis (44.7% of the country's population), Pashtuns, also known as Pathans (15.4%), Sindhis (14.1%), Saraikis (8.4%), Muhajirs (the Indian emigrants, mostly Urdu-speaking), who make up 7.6% of the population, and the Baloch with 3.6%.[3] The remaining 6.3% consist of a number of ethnic minorities such as the Brahuis,[541] the Hindkowans, the various peoples of Gilgit-Baltistan, the Kashmiris, the Sheedis (who are of African descent),[554] and the Hazaras.[555] There is also a large Pakistani diaspora worldwide, numbering over seven million,[556] which has been recorded as the sixth largest diaspora in the world.[557] Urbanisation Main article: Urbanisation in Pakistan Kalma Underpass, Lahore   Blue Area, Islamabad Since achieving independence as a result of the partition of India, the urbanisation has increased exponentially, with several different causes.[535] The majority of the population in the south resides along the Indus River, with Karachi the most populous commercial city.[535] In the east, west, and north, most of the population lives in an arc formed by the cities of Lahore, Faisalabad, Rawalpindi, Islamabad, Sargodha, Gujranwala, Sialkot, Gujrat, Jhelum, Sheikhupura, Nowshera, Mardan, and Peshawar. During the period 1990–2008, city dwellers made up 36% of Pakistan's population, making it the most urbanised nation in South Asia. Furthermore, more than 50% of Pakistanis live in towns of 5,000 people or more.[537] Immigration, from both within and outside the country, is regarded as one of the main factors contributing to urbanisation in Pakistan. One analysis of the 1998 national census highlighted the significance of the partition of India in the 1940s as it relates to urban change in Pakistan.[558] During and after the independence period, Urdu speaking Muslims from India migrated in large numbers to Pakistan, especially to the port city of Karachi, which is today the largest metropolis in Pakistan.[558] Migration from other countries, mainly from those nearby, has further accelerated the process of urbanisation in Pakistani cities. Inevitably, the rapid urbanisation caused by these large population movements has also created new political and socio-economic challenges.[558] In addition to immigration, economic trends such as the green revolution and political developments, among a host of other factors, are also important causes of urbanisation.[558]  vte Largest cities or towns in Pakistan According to the 2017 Census[559] Rank Name Province Pop. Rank Name Province Pop. Karachi Karachi Lahore Lahore 1 Karachi Sindh 14,916,456 11 Bahawalpur Punjab 762,111 Faisalabad Faisalabad Rawalpindi Rawalpindi 2 Lahore Punjab 11,126,285 12 Sargodha Punjab 659,862 3 Faisalabad Punjab 3,204,726 13 Sialkot Punjab 655,852 4 Rawalpindi Punjab 2,098,231 14 Sukkur Sindh 499,900 5 Gujranwala Punjab 2,027,001 15 Larkana Sindh 490,508 6 Peshawar Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 1,970,042 16 Sheikhupura Punjab 473,129 7 Multan Punjab 1,871,843 17 Rahim Yar Khan Punjab 420,419 8 Hyderabad Sindh 1,734,309 18 Jhang Punjab 414,131 9 Islamabad Capital Territory 1,009,832 19 Dera Ghazi Khan Punjab 399,064 10 Quetta Balochistan 1,001,205 20 Gujrat Punjab 390,533 Religion Main article: Religion in Pakistan [564][565] Religions in Pakistan[560][561][562][563] Religions Percent Islam   96.0% Hinduism   1.85% Christianity   1.5% others/non-religious   0.6% The state religion in Pakistan is Sunni Islam. Freedom of religion is guaranteed by the Constitution of Pakistan, which provides all its citizens the right to profess, practice and propagate their religion subject to law, public order, and morality.[566] The population of Pakistan follow different religions. Most of Pakistanis are Muslims (96.0%) followed by Hindus (1.85%) and Christians (1.5%). There are also people in Pakistan who follow other religions, such as Sikhism, Buddhism, Jainism and the minority of Parsi (who follow Zoroastrianism). The Kalash people maintain a unique identity and religion within Pakistan.[567] In addition, some Pakistanis also do not profess any faith (such as atheists and agnostics) in Pakistan. According to the 1998 census, people who did not state their religion accounted for 0.5% of the population. Islam See also: Islam in Pakistan and Sufism in Pakistan Faisal Mosque, built in 1986 by Turkish architect Vedat Dalokay on behalf of King Faisal bin Abdul-Aziz of Saudi Arabia Islam is the dominant religion.[568] About 96% of Pakistanis are Muslim. Pakistan has the second-largest number of Muslims in the world after Indonesia.[569][570] The majority of them are Sunni and mostly follows Sufism (estimated between 75 and 95%)[571][572][573][574][575] while Shias represent between 5–25%.[571][572][576][577] The Ahmadis, a small minority representing 0.22–2% of Pakistan's population,[578] are officially considered non-Muslims by virtue of the constitutional amendment.[579] The Ahmadis are particularly persecuted, especially since 1974 when they were banned from calling themselves Muslims. In 1984, Ahmadiyya places of worship were banned from being called "mosques".[580] As of 2012, 12% of Pakistani Muslims self-identify as non-denominational Muslims.[581] There are also several Quraniyoon communities.[582][583] Sufism, a mystical Islamic tradition, has a long history and a large following among the Sunni Muslims in Pakistan, at both the academic and popular levels. Popular Sufi culture is centered around gatherings and celebrations at the shrines of saints and annual festivals that feature Sufi music and dance. Two Sufis whose shrines receive much national attention are Ali Hajweri in Lahore (c. 12th century)[584] and Shahbaz Qalander in Sehwan, Sindh (c. 12th century).[585] There are two levels of Sufism in Pakistan. The first is the 'populist' Sufism of the rural population. This level of Sufism involves belief in intercession through saints, veneration of their shrines, and forming bonds (Mureed) with a pir (saint). Many rural Pakistani Muslims associate with pirs and seek their intercession.[586] The second level of Sufism in Pakistan is 'intellectual Sufism', which is growing among the urban and educated population. They are influenced by the writings of Sufis such as the medieval theologian al-Ghazali, the Sufi reformer Shaykh Aḥmad Sirhindi, and Shah Wali Allah.[587] Contemporary Islamic fundamentalists criticise Sufism's popular character, which in their view does not accurately reflect the teachings and practice of Muhammad and his companions.[588] Hinduism See also: Hinduism in Pakistan A Hindu temple situated in the Katasraj temple complex Shri Hinglaj Mata temple shakti peetha is the largest Hindu pilgrimage centre in Pakistan. The annual Hinglaj Yathra is attended by more than 250,000 people.[589] Hinduism is the second-largest religion in Pakistan after Islam, according to the 1998 census.[590] As of 2010, Pakistan had the fifth-largest Hindu population in the world.[591] In the 1998 census, the Hindu (jati) population was found to be 2,111,271 while the Hindu (scheduled castes) numbered an additional 332,343.[590] Hindus are found in all provinces of Pakistan but are mostly concentrated in Sindh. They speak a variety of languages such as Sindhi, Seraiki, Aer, Dhatki, Gera, Goaria, Gurgula, Jandavra, Kabutra, Koli, Loarki, Marwari, Sansi, Vaghri,[592] and Gujarati.[543] At the time of Pakistan's creation, the 'hostage theory' gained currency. According to this theory, the Hindu minority in Pakistan was to be given a fair deal in Pakistan in order to ensure the protection of the Muslim minority in India.[593][594] However, Khawaja Nazimuddin, the second Prime Minister of Pakistan, stated: I do not agree that religion is a private affair of the individual nor do I agree that in an Islamic state every citizen has identical rights, no matter what his caste, creed or faith be.[595] Some Hindus in Pakistan feel that they are treated as second-class citizens and many have continued to migrate to India.[596] Pakistani Hindus faced riots after the Babri Masjid demolition,[597] endured a massacre (in 2005) by security forces in Balochistan,[598] and have experienced other attacks, forced conversions, and abductions.[599][600][601] Christianity and other religions Sacred Heart Cathedral, Lahore Gurdwara Panja Sahib in Hasan Abdal Christians formed the next largest religious minority, after Hindus, with a population of 2,092,902, according to the 1998 census.[602] They were followed by the Bahá'í Faith, which had a following of 30,000, then Sikhism, Buddhism, and Zoroastrianism, each back then claiming 20,000 adherents,[603] and a very small community of Jains. There is a Roman Catholic community in Karachi that was established by Goan and Tamil migrants when Karachi's infrastructure was being developed by the British during the colonial administration between World War I and World War II. The influence of atheism is very small, with 1.0% of the population identifying as atheist in 2005.[604] However, the figure rose to 2.0% in 2012 according to Gallup.[604] Culture and society Main articles: British heritage of Pakistan, Culture of Pakistan, and Public holidays in Pakistan Truck art is a distinctive feature of Pakistani culture. Civil society in Pakistan is largely hierarchical, emphasising local cultural etiquette and traditional Islamic values that govern personal and political life. The basic family unit is the extended family,[605] although for socio-economic reasons there has been a growing trend towards nuclear families.[606] The traditional dress for both men and women is the Shalwar Kameez; trousers, jeans, and shirts are also popular among men.[59] In recent decades, the middle class has increased to around 35 million and the upper and upper-middle classes to around 17 million, and power is shifting from rural landowners to the urbanised elites.[607] Pakistani festivals, including Eid-ul-Fitr, Eid-ul-Azha, Ramazan, Christmas, Easter, Holi, and Diwali, are mostly religious in origin.[605] Increasing globalisation has resulted in Pakistan ranking 56th on the A.T. Kearney/FP Globalization Index.[608] Clothing, arts, and fashion Main articles: Pakistani clothing, Shalwar kameez, Sherwani, Jinnah cap, and Peshawari chappal People in traditional clothing in Neelum District The Shalwar Kameez is the national dress of Pakistan and is worn by both men and women in all four provinces: Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan, and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa as well as in FATA and Azad Kashmir. Each province has its own style of Shalwar Kameez. Pakistanis wear clothes in a range of exquisite colours and designs and in type of fabric (silk, chiffon, cotton, etc.).[609] Besides the national dress, domestically tailored suits and neckties are often worn by men, and are customary in offices, schools, and social gatherings.[609] The fashion industry has flourished in the changing environment of the fashion world. Since Pakistan came into being, its fashion has evolved in different phases and developed a unique identity. Today, Pakistani fashion is a combination of traditional and modern dress and has become a mark of Pakistani culture. Despite modern trends, regional and traditional forms of dress have developed their own significance as a symbol of native tradition. This regional fashion continues to evolve into both more modern and purer forms. The Pakistan Fashion Design Council based in Lahore organizes PFDC Fashion Week and the Fashion Pakistan Council based in Karachi organizes Fashion Pakistan Week. Pakistan's first fashion week was held in November 2009.[610] Media and entertainment Main articles: Cinema of Pakistan, Media of Pakistan, Music of Pakistan, History of Pakistani pop music, Theatre of Pakistan, and Pakistani dramas The private print media, state-owned Pakistan Television Corporation (PTV), and Pakistan Broadcasting Corporation (PBC) for radio were the dominant media outlets until the beginning of the 21st century. Pakistan now has a large network of domestic, privately owned 24-hour news media and television channels.[611] A 2016 report by the Reporters Without Borders ranked Pakistan 147th on the Press Freedom Index, while at the same time terming the Pakistani media "among the freest in Asia when it comes to covering the squabbling among politicians."[612] BBC calls the Pakistani media "among the most outspoken in South Asia".[613] Pakistani media has also played a vital role in exposing corruption.[614] The Lollywood, Kariwood, Punjabi, and Pashto film industry is based in Karachi, Lahore, and Peshawar. While Bollywood films were banned from public cinemas from 1965 until 2008, they have remained an important part of popular culture.[615][616] In contrast to the ailing Pakistani film industry, Urdu televised dramas and theatrical performances continue to be popular, as many entertainment media outlets air them regularly.[617] Urdu dramas dominate the television entertainment industry, which has launched critically acclaimed miniseries and featured popular actors and actresses since the 1990s.[618] In the 1960s–1970s, pop music and disco (1970s) dominated the country's music industry. In the 1980s–1990s, British influenced rock music appeared and jolted the country's entertainment industry.[619] In the 2000s, heavy metal music gained popular and critical acclaim.[620] Pakistani music ranges from diverse forms of provincial folk music and traditional styles such as Qawwali and Ghazal Gayaki to modern musical forms that fuse traditional and western music.[621][622] Pakistan has many famous folk singers. The arrival of Afghan refugees in the western provinces has stimulated interest in Pashto music, although there has been intolerance of it in some places.[623] Diaspora Main article: Overseas Pakistani According to the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Pakistan has the sixth-largest diaspora in the world.[557] Statistics gathered by the Pakistani government show that there are around 7 million Pakistanis residing abroad, with the vast majority living in the Middle East, Europe, and North America.[624] Pakistan ranks 10th in the world for remittances sent home.[625][626] The largest inflow of remittances, as of 2016, is from Saudi Arabia, amounting to $5.9 billion.[627] The term Overseas Pakistani is officially recognised by the Government of Pakistan. The Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis was established in 2008 to deal exclusively with all matters of overseas Pakistanis such as attending to their needs and problems, developing projects for their welfare, and working for resolution of their problems and issues. Overseas Pakistanis are the second-largest source of foreign exchange remittances to Pakistan after exports. Over the last several years, home remittances have maintained a steadily rising trend, with a more than 100% increase from US$8.9 billion in 2009–10 to US$19.9 billion in 2015–16.[377][625][626] The Overseas Pakistani Division (OPD) was created in September 2004 within the Ministry of Labour (MoL). It has since recognised the importance of overseas Pakistanis and their contribution to the nation's economy. Together with Community Welfare Attaches (CWAs) and the Overseas Pakistanis Foundation (OPF), the OPD is making efforts to improve the welfare of Pakistanis who reside abroad. The division aims to provide better services through improved facilities at airports, and suitable schemes for housing, education, and health care. It also facilitates the reintegration into society of returning overseas Pakistanis. Notable members of the Pakistani diaspora include London Mayor Sadiq Khan, UK Cabinet Member Sajid Javid, former UK Conservative Party Chair Baroness Warsi, singers Zayn Malik and Nadia Ali, MIT Physics Professor Dr. Nergis Mavalvala, actors Riz Ahmed and Kumail Nanjiani, businessmen Shahid Khan and Sir Anwar Pervez, Boston University professors Adil Najam and Hamid Nawab, Texas A&M Professor Muhammad Suhail Zubairy, Yale Professor Sara Suleri, UC San Diego Professor Farooq Azam, and historian Ayesha Jalal. Literature and philosophy Muhammad Iqbal Muhammad Iqbal, Pakistan's national poet who conceived the idea of Pakistan Main articles: Literature of Pakistan, Urdu poetry, and Pakistani philosophy Pakistan has literature in Urdu, Sindhi, Punjabi, Pashto, Baluchi, Persian, English, and many other languages.[628] The Pakistan Academy of Letters is a large literary community that promotes literature and poetry in Pakistan and abroad.[629] The National Library publishes and promotes literature in the country. Before the 19th century, Pakistani literature consisted mainly of lyric and religious poetry and mystical and folkloric works. During the colonial period, native literary figures were influenced by western literary realism and took up increasingly varied topics and narrative forms. Prose fiction is now very popular.[630][631] The Tomb of Shah Rukn-e-Alam is part of Pakistan's Sufi heritage.[632] The national poet of Pakistan, Muhammad Iqbal, wrote poetry in Urdu and Persian. He was a strong proponent of the political and spiritual revival of Islamic civilisation and encouraged Muslims all over the world to bring about a successful revolution.[clarification needed][633][634][635] Well-known figures in contemporary Pakistani Urdu literature include Josh Malihabadi Faiz Ahmed Faiz and Saadat Hasan Manto. Sadequain and Gulgee are known for their calligraphy and paintings.[631] The Sufi poets Shah Abdul Latif, Bulleh Shah, Mian Muhammad Bakhsh, and Khawaja Farid enjoy considerable popularity in Pakistan.[636] Mirza Kalich Beg has been termed the father of modern Sindhi prose.[637] Historically, philosophical development in the country was dominated by Muhammad Iqbal, Sir Syed, Muhammad Asad, Maududi, and Mohammad Ali Johar.[638] Ideas from British and American philosophy greatly shaped philosophical development in Pakistan. Analysts such as M. M. Sharif and Zafar Hassan established the first major Pakistani philosophical movement in 1947.[clarification needed][639] After the 1971 war, philosophers such as Jalaludin Abdur Rahim, Gianchandani, and Malik Khalid incorporated Marxism into Pakistan's philosophical thinking.[640] Influential work by Manzoor Ahmad, Jon Elia, Hasan Askari Rizvi, and Abdul Khaliq brought mainstream social, political, and analytical philosophy to the fore in academia.[640] Works by Noam Chomsky have influenced philosophical ideas in various fields of social and political philosophy.[641][642] Architecture Main articles: Pakistani architecture and Hindu and Buddhist architectural heritage of Pakistan Minar-e-Pakistan is a national monument marking Pakistan's independence movement.   Lahore Fort, a landmark built during the Mughal era, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.   Karachi Metropolitan Corporation Building Four periods are recognised in Pakistani architecture: pre-Islamic, Islamic, colonial, and post-colonial. With the beginning of the Indus civilization around the middle of the 3rd millennium BCE,[643] an advanced urban culture developed for the first time in the region, with large buildings, some of which survive to this day.[644] Mohenjo Daro, Harappa, and Kot Diji are among the pre-Islamic settlements that are now tourist attractions.[199] The rise of Buddhism and the influence of Greek civilisation led to the development of a Greco-Buddhist style,[645] starting from the 1st century CE. The high point of this era was the Gandhara style. An example of Buddhist architecture is the ruins of the Buddhist monastery Takht-i-Bahi in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.[646] The arrival of Islam in what is today Pakistan meant the sudden end of Buddhist architecture in the area and a smooth transition to the predominantly pictureless Islamic architecture. The most important Indo-Islamic-style building still standing is the tomb of the Shah Rukn-i-Alam in Multan. During the Mughal era, design elements of Persian-Islamic architecture were fused with and often produced playful forms of Hindustani art. Lahore, as the occasional residence of Mughal rulers, contains many important buildings from the empire. Most prominent among them are the Badshahi Mosque, the fortress of Lahore with the famous Alamgiri Gate, the colourful, Mughal-style Wazir Khan Mosque,[647] the Shalimar Gardens in Lahore, and the Shahjahan Mosque in Thatta. In the British colonial period, predominantly functional buildings of the Indo-European representative style developed from a mixture of European and Indian-Islamic components. Post-colonial national identity is expressed in modern structures such as the Faisal Mosque, the Minar-e-Pakistan, and the Mazar-e-Quaid.[648] Several examples of architectural infrastructure demonstrating the influence of British design can be found in Lahore, Peshawar, and Karachi.[648] Food and drink Main article: Pakistani cuisine Traditional food Located on the bank of Arabian Sea in Karachi, Port Grand is one of the largest food streets of Asia.[649]   Food street located on Stadium Road, Sargodha   A Pakistani dish prepared using the tandoori method Pakistani cuisine is similar to that of other regions of South Asia, with some of it being originated from the royal kitchens of 16th-century Mughal emperors.[650] Most of those dishes have their roots in British, Indian, Central Asian and Middle Eastern cuisine.[651] Unlike Middle Eastern cuisine, Pakistani cooking uses large quantities of spices, herbs, and seasoning. Garlic, ginger, turmeric, red chili, and garam masala are used in most dishes, and home cooking regularly includes curry, roti, a thin flatbread made from wheat, is a staple food, usually served with curry, meat, vegetables, and lentils. Rice is also common; it is served plain, fried with spices, and in sweet dishes.[195][652][653] Lassi is a traditional drink in the Punjab region. Black tea with milk and sugar is popular throughout Pakistan and is consumed daily by most of the population.[59][654] Sohan halwa is a popular sweet dish from the southern region of Punjab province and is enjoyed all over Pakistan.[655]
India, officially the Republic of India (ISO: Bhārat Gaṇarājya),[25] is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area; the most populous country as of June 1, 2023;[26][27] and from the time of its independence in 1947, the world's most populous democracy.[28][29][30] Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the southwest, and the Bay of Bengal on the southeast, it shares land borders with Pakistan to the west;[j] China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the north; and Bangladesh and Myanmar to the east. In the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives; its Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand, Myanmar, and Indonesia. Modern humans arrived on the Indian subcontinent from Africa no later than 55,000 years ago.[31][32][33] Their long occupation, initially in varying forms of isolation as hunter-gatherers, has made the region highly diverse, second only to Africa in human genetic diversity.[34] Settled life emerged on the subcontinent in the western margins of the Indus river basin 9,000 years ago, evolving gradually into the Indus Valley Civilisation of the third millennium BCE.[35] By 1200 BCE, an archaic form of Sanskrit, an Indo-European language, had diffused into India from the northwest.[36][37] Its evidence today is found in the hymns of the Rigveda. Preserved by an oral tradition that was resolutely vigilant, the Rigveda records the dawning of Hinduism in India.[38] The Dravidian languages of India were supplanted in the northern and western regions.[39] By 400 BCE, stratification and exclusion by caste had emerged within Hinduism,[40] and Buddhism and Jainism had arisen, proclaiming social orders unlinked to heredity.[41] Early political consolidations gave rise to the loose-knit Maurya and Gupta Empires based in the Ganges Basin.[42] Their collective era was suffused with wide-ranging creativity,[43] but also marked by the declining status of women,[44] and the incorporation of untouchability into an organised system of belief.[k][45] In South India, the Middle kingdoms exported Dravidian-languages scripts and religious cultures to the kingdoms of Southeast Asia.[46] In the early medieval era, Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism became established on India's southern and western coasts.[47] Muslim armies from Central Asia intermittently overran India's northern plains,[48] eventually founding the Delhi Sultanate, and drawing northern India into the cosmopolitan networks of medieval Islam.[49] In the 15th century, the Vijayanagara Empire created a long-lasting composite Hindu culture in south India.[50] In the Punjab, Sikhism emerged, rejecting institutionalised religion.[51] The Mughal Empire, in 1526, ushered in two centuries of relative peace,[52] leaving a legacy of luminous architecture.[l][53] Gradually expanding rule of the British East India Company followed, turning India into a colonial economy, but also consolidating its sovereignty.[54] British Crown rule began in 1858. The rights promised to Indians were granted slowly,[55][56] but technological changes were introduced, and modern ideas of education and the public life took root.[57] A pioneering and influential nationalist movement emerged, which was noted for nonviolent resistance and became the major factor in ending British rule.[58][59] In 1947 the British Indian Empire was partitioned into two independent dominions,[60][61][62][63] a Hindu-majority Dominion of India and a Muslim-majority Dominion of Pakistan, amid large-scale loss of life and an unprecedented migration.[64] India has been a federal republic since 1950, governed through a democratic parliamentary system. It is a pluralistic, multilingual and multi-ethnic society. India's population grew from 361 million in 1951 to almost 1.4 billion in 2022.[65] During the same time, its nominal per capita income increased from US$64 annually to US$2,601, and its literacy rate from 16.6% to 74%. From being a comparatively destitute country in 1951,[66] India has become a fast-growing major economy and a hub for information technology services, with an expanding middle class.[67] It has a space programme. Indian movies, music, and spiritual teachings play an increasing role in global culture.[68] India has substantially reduced its rate of poverty, though at the cost of increasing economic inequality.[69] India is a nuclear-weapon state, which ranks high in military expenditure. It has disputes over Kashmir with its neighbours, Pakistan and China, unresolved since the mid-20th century.[70] Among the socio-economic challenges India faces are gender inequality, child malnutrition,[71] and rising levels of air pollution.[72] India's land is megadiverse, with four biodiversity hotspots.[73] Its forest cover comprises 21.7% of its area.[74] India's wildlife, which has traditionally been viewed with tolerance in India's culture,[75] is supported among these forests, and elsewhere, in protected habitats. Etymology According to the Oxford English Dictionary (third edition 2009), the name "India" is derived from the Classical Latin India, a reference to South Asia and an uncertain region to its east; and in turn derived successively from: Hellenistic Greek India ( Ἰνδία); ancient Greek Indos ( Ἰνδός); Old Persian Hindush, an eastern province of the Achaemenid Empire; and ultimately its cognate, the Sanskrit Sindhu, or "river," specifically the Indus River and, by implication, its well-settled southern basin.[76][77] The ancient Greeks referred to the Indians as Indoi (Ἰνδοί), which translates as "The people of the Indus".[78] The term Bharat (Bhārat; pronounced [ˈbʱaːɾət] (listen)), mentioned in both Indian epic poetry and the Constitution of India,[79][80] is used in its variations by many Indian languages. A modern rendering of the historical name Bharatavarsha, which applied originally to North India,[81][82] Bharat gained increased currency from the mid-19th century as a native name for India.[79][83] Hindustan ([ɦɪndʊˈstaːn] (listen)) is a Middle Persian name for India that became popular by the 13th century,[84] and was used widely since the era of Mughal Empire. The meaning of Hindustan has varied, referring to a region encompassing present-day northern India and Pakistan or to India in its near entirety.[79][83][85] History Main articles: History of India and History of the Republic of India Ancient India Manuscript illustration, c. 1650, of the Sanskrit epic Ramayana, composed in story-telling fashion c. 400 BCE – c. 300 CE[86] By 55,000 years ago, the first modern humans, or Homo sapiens, had arrived on the Indian subcontinent from Africa, where they had earlier evolved.[31][32][33] The earliest known modern human remains in South Asia date to about 30,000 years ago.[31] After 6500 BCE, evidence for domestication of food crops and animals, construction of permanent structures, and storage of agricultural surplus appeared in Mehrgarh and other sites in Balochistan, Pakistan.[87] These gradually developed into the Indus Valley Civilisation,[88][87] the first urban culture in South Asia,[89] which flourished during 2500–1900 BCE in Pakistan and western India.[90] Centred around cities such as Mohenjo-daro, Harappa, Dholavira, and Kalibangan, and relying on varied forms of subsistence, the civilisation engaged robustly in crafts production and wide-ranging trade.[89] During the period 2000–500 BCE, many regions of the subcontinent transitioned from the Chalcolithic cultures to the Iron Age ones.[91] The Vedas, the oldest scriptures associated with Hinduism,[92] were composed during this period,[93] and historians have analysed these to posit a Vedic culture in the Punjab region and the upper Gangetic Plain.[91] Most historians also consider this period to have encompassed several waves of Indo-Aryan migration into the subcontinent from the north-west.[92] The caste system, which created a hierarchy of priests, warriors, and free peasants, but which excluded indigenous peoples by labelling their occupations impure, arose during this period.[94] On the Deccan Plateau, archaeological evidence from this period suggests the existence of a chiefdom stage of political organisation.[91] In South India, a progression to sedentary life is indicated by the large number of megalithic monuments dating from this period,[95] as well as by nearby traces of agriculture, irrigation tanks, and craft traditions.[95] Cave 26 of the rock-cut Ajanta Caves In the late Vedic period, around the 6th century BCE, the small states and chiefdoms of the Ganges Plain and the north-western regions had consolidated into 16 major oligarchies and monarchies that were known as the mahajanapadas.[96][97] The emerging urbanisation gave rise to non-Vedic religious movements, two of which became independent religions. Jainism came into prominence during the life of its exemplar, Mahavira.[98] Buddhism, based on the teachings of Gautama Buddha, attracted followers from all social classes excepting the middle class; chronicling the life of the Buddha was central to the beginnings of recorded history in India.[99][100][101] In an age of increasing urban wealth, both religions held up renunciation as an ideal,[102] and both established long-lasting monastic traditions. Politically, by the 3rd century BCE, the kingdom of Magadha had annexed or reduced other states to emerge as the Mauryan Empire.[103] The empire was once thought to have controlled most of the subcontinent except the far south, but its core regions are now thought to have been separated by large autonomous areas.[104][105] The Mauryan kings are known as much for their empire-building and determined management of public life as for Ashoka's renunciation of militarism and far-flung advocacy of the Buddhist dhamma.[106][107] The Sangam literature of the Tamil language reveals that, between 200 BCE and 200 CE, the southern peninsula was ruled by the Cheras, the Cholas, and the Pandyas, dynasties that traded extensively with the Roman Empire and with West and Southeast Asia.[108][109] In North India, Hinduism asserted patriarchal control within the family, leading to increased subordination of women.[110][103] By the 4th and 5th centuries, the Gupta Empire had created a complex system of administration and taxation in the greater Ganges Plain; this system became a model for later Indian kingdoms.[111][112] Under the Guptas, a renewed Hinduism based on devotion, rather than the management of ritual, began to assert itself.[113] This renewal was reflected in a flowering of sculpture and architecture, which found patrons among an urban elite.[112] Classical Sanskrit literature flowered as well, and Indian science, astronomy, medicine, and mathematics made significant advances.[112] Medieval India Brihadeshwara temple, Thanjavur, completed in 1010 CE The Qutub Minar, 73 m (240 ft) tall, completed by the Sultan of Delhi, Iltutmish The Indian early medieval age, from 600 to 1200 CE, is defined by regional kingdoms and cultural diversity.[114] When Harsha of Kannauj, who ruled much of the Indo-Gangetic Plain from 606 to 647 CE, attempted to expand southwards, he was defeated by the Chalukya ruler of the Deccan.[115] When his successor attempted to expand eastwards, he was defeated by the Pala king of Bengal.[115] When the Chalukyas attempted to expand southwards, they were defeated by the Pallavas from farther south, who in turn were opposed by the Pandyas and the Cholas from still farther south.[115] No ruler of this period was able to create an empire and consistently control lands much beyond their core region.[114] During this time, pastoral peoples, whose land had been cleared to make way for the growing agricultural economy, were accommodated within caste society, as were new non-traditional ruling classes.[116] The caste system consequently began to show regional differences.[116] In the 6th and 7th centuries, the first devotional hymns were created in the Tamil language.[117] They were imitated all over India and led to both the resurgence of Hinduism and the development of all modern languages of the subcontinent.[117] Indian royalty, big and small, and the temples they patronised drew citizens in great numbers to the capital cities, which became economic hubs as well.[118] Temple towns of various sizes began to appear everywhere as India underwent another urbanisation.[118] By the 8th and 9th centuries, the effects were felt in South-East Asia, as South Indian culture and political systems were exported to lands that became part of modern-day Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Brunei, Cambodia, Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, and Indonesia.[119] Indian merchants, scholars, and sometimes armies were involved in this transmission; South-East Asians took the initiative as well, with many sojourning in Indian seminaries and translating Buddhist and Hindu texts into their languages.[119] After the 10th century, Muslim Central Asian nomadic clans, using swift-horse cavalry and raising vast armies united by ethnicity and religion, repeatedly overran South Asia's north-western plains, leading eventually to the establishment of the Islamic Delhi Sultanate in 1206.[120] The sultanate was to control much of North India and to make many forays into South India. Although at first disruptive for the Indian elites, the sultanate largely left its vast non-Muslim subject population to its own laws and customs.[121][122] By repeatedly repulsing Mongol raiders in the 13th century, the sultanate saved India from the devastation visited on West and Central Asia, setting the scene for centuries of migration of fleeing soldiers, learned men, mystics, traders, artists, and artisans from that region into the subcontinent, thereby creating a syncretic Indo-Islamic culture in the north.[123][124] The sultanate's raiding and weakening of the regional kingdoms of South India paved the way for the indigenous Vijayanagara Empire.[125] Embracing a strong Shaivite tradition and building upon the military technology of the sultanate, the empire came to control much of peninsular India,[126] and was to influence South Indian society for long afterwards.[125] Early modern India In the early 16th century, northern India, then under mainly Muslim rulers,[127] fell again to the superior mobility and firepower of a new generation of Central Asian warriors.[128] The resulting Mughal Empire did not stamp out the local societies it came to rule. Instead, it balanced and pacified them through new administrative practices[129][130] and diverse and inclusive ruling elites,[131] leading to more systematic, centralised, and uniform rule.[132] Eschewing tribal bonds and Islamic identity, especially under Akbar, the Mughals united their far-flung realms through loyalty, expressed through a Persianised culture, to an emperor who had near-divine status.[131] The Mughal state's economic policies, deriving most revenues from agriculture[133] and mandating that taxes be paid in the well-regulated silver currency,[134] caused peasants and artisans to enter larger markets.[132] The relative peace maintained by the empire during much of the 17th century was a factor in India's economic expansion,[132] resulting in greater patronage of painting, literary forms, textiles, and architecture.[135] Newly coherent social groups in northern and western India, such as the Marathas, the Rajputs, and the Sikhs, gained military and governing ambitions during Mughal rule, which, through collaboration or adversity, gave them both recognition and military experience.[136] Expanding commerce during Mughal rule gave rise to new Indian commercial and political elites along the coasts of southern and eastern India.[136] As the empire disintegrated, many among these elites were able to seek and control their own affairs.[137] A distant view of the Taj Mahal from the Agra Fort A two mohur Company gold coin, issued in 1835, the obverse inscribed "William IV, King" By the early 18th century, with the lines between commercial and political dominance being increasingly blurred, a number of European trading companies, including the English East India Company, had established coastal outposts.[138][139] The East India Company's control of the seas, greater resources, and more advanced military training and technology led it to increasingly assert its military strength and caused it to become attractive to a portion of the Indian elite; these factors were crucial in allowing the company to gain control over the Bengal region by 1765 and sideline the other European companies.[140][138][141][142] Its further access to the riches of Bengal and the subsequent increased strength and size of its army enabled it to annex or subdue most of India by the 1820s.[143] India was then no longer exporting manufactured goods as it long had, but was instead supplying the British Empire with raw materials. Many historians consider this to be the onset of India's colonial period.[138] By this time, with its economic power severely curtailed by the British parliament and having effectively been made an arm of British administration, the East India Company began more consciously to enter non-economic arenas, including education, social reform, and culture.[144] Modern India Main article: History of the Republic of India Historians consider India's modern age to have begun sometime between 1848 and 1885. The appointment in 1848 of Lord Dalhousie as Governor General of the East India Company set the stage for changes essential to a modern state. These included the consolidation and demarcation of sovereignty, the surveillance of the population, and the education of citizens. Technological changes—among them, railways, canals, and the telegraph—were introduced not long after their introduction in Europe.[145][146][147][148] However, disaffection with the company also grew during this time and set off the Indian Rebellion of 1857. Fed by diverse resentments and perceptions, including invasive British-style social reforms, harsh land taxes, and summary treatment of some rich landowners and princes, the rebellion rocked many regions of northern and central India and shook the foundations of Company rule.[149][150] Although the rebellion was suppressed by 1858, it led to the dissolution of the East India Company and the direct administration of India by the British government. Proclaiming a unitary state and a gradual but limited British-style parliamentary system, the new rulers also protected princes and landed gentry as a feudal safeguard against future unrest.[151][152] In the decades following, public life gradually emerged all over India, leading eventually to the founding of the Indian National Congress in 1885.[153][154][155][156] The rush of technology and the commercialisation of agriculture in the second half of the 19th century was marked by economic setbacks and many small farmers became dependent on the whims of far-away markets.[157] There was an increase in the number of large-scale famines,[158] and, despite the risks of infrastructure development borne by Indian taxpayers, little industrial employment was generated for Indians.[159] There were also salutary effects: commercial cropping, especially in the newly canalled Punjab, led to increased food production for internal consumption.[160] The railway network provided critical famine relief,[161] notably reduced the cost of moving goods,[161] and helped nascent Indian-owned industry.[160] 1909 map of the British Indian Empire Jawaharlal Nehru sharing a light moment with Mahatma Gandhi, Mumbai, 6 July 1946 After World War I, in which approximately one million Indians served,[162] a new period began. It was marked by British reforms but also repressive legislation, by more strident Indian calls for self-rule, and by the beginnings of a nonviolent movement of non-co-operation, of which Mahatma Gandhi would become the leader and enduring symbol.[163] During the 1930s, slow legislative reform was enacted by the British; the Indian National Congress won victories in the resulting elections.[164] The next decade was beset with crises: Indian participation in World War II, the Congress's final push for non-co-operation, and an upsurge of Muslim nationalism. All were capped by the advent of independence in 1947, but tempered by the partition of India into two states: India and Pakistan.[165] Vital to India's self-image as an independent nation was its constitution, completed in 1950, which put in place a secular and democratic republic.[166] Per the London Declaration, India retained its membership of the Commonwealth, becoming the first republic within it.[167] Economic liberalisation, which began in the 1990s, has created a large urban middle class, transformed India into one of the world's fastest-growing economies,[168] and increased its geopolitical clout. Indian films, music, and spiritual teachings play an increasing role in global culture.[169] Yet, India is also shaped by seemingly unyielding poverty, both rural and urban;[169] by religious and caste-related violence;[170] by Maoist-inspired Naxalite insurgencies;[171] and by separatism in Jammu and Kashmir and in Northeast India.[172] It has unresolved territorial disputes with China[173] and with Pakistan.[173] India's sustained democratic freedoms are unique among the world's newer nations; however, in spite of its recent economic successes, freedom from want for its disadvantaged population remains a goal yet to be achieved.[174] Geography Main article: Geography of India India accounts for the bulk of the Indian subcontinent, lying atop the Indian tectonic plate, a part of the Indo-Australian Plate.[175] India's defining geological processes began 75 million years ago when the Indian Plate, then part of the southern supercontinent Gondwana, began a north-eastward drift caused by seafloor spreading to its south-west, and later, south and south-east.[175] Simultaneously, the vast Tethyan oceanic crust, to its northeast, began to subduct under the Eurasian Plate.[175] These dual processes, driven by convection in the Earth's mantle, both created the Indian Ocean and caused the Indian continental crust eventually to under-thrust Eurasia and to uplift the Himalayas.[175] Immediately south of the emerging Himalayas, plate movement created a vast crescent-shaped trough that rapidly filled with river-borne sediment[176] and now constitutes the Indo-Gangetic Plain.[177] The original Indian plate makes its first appearance above the sediment in the ancient Aravalli range, which extends from the Delhi Ridge in a southwesterly direction. To the west lies the Thar Desert, the eastern spread of which is checked by the Aravallis.[178][179][180] The Tungabhadra, with rocky outcrops, flows into the peninsular Krishna river.[181] Fishing boats lashed together in a tidal creek in Anjarle village, Maharashtra The remaining Indian Plate survives as peninsular India, the oldest and geologically most stable part of India. It extends as far north as the Satpura and Vindhya ranges in central India. These parallel chains run from the Arabian Sea coast in Gujarat in the west to the coal-rich Chota Nagpur Plateau in Jharkhand in the east.[182] To the south, the remaining peninsular landmass, the Deccan Plateau, is flanked on the west and east by coastal ranges known as the Western and Eastern Ghats;[183] the plateau contains the country's oldest rock formations, some over one billion years old. Constituted in such fashion, India lies to the north of the equator between 6° 44′ and 35° 30′ north latitude[m] and 68° 7′ and 97° 25′ east longitude.[184] India's coastline measures 7,517 kilometres (4,700 mi) in length; of this distance, 5,423 kilometres (3,400 mi) belong to peninsular India and 2,094 kilometres (1,300 mi) to the Andaman, Nicobar, and Lakshadweep island chains.[185] According to the Indian naval hydrographic charts, the mainland coastline consists of the following: 43% sandy beaches; 11% rocky shores, including cliffs; and 46% mudflats or marshy shores.[185] Major Himalayan-origin rivers that substantially flow through India include the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, both of which drain into the Bay of Bengal.[186] Important tributaries of the Ganges include the Yamuna and the Kosi; the latter's extremely low gradient, caused by long-term silt deposition, leads to severe floods and course changes.[187][188] Major peninsular rivers, whose steeper gradients prevent their waters from flooding, include the Godavari, the Mahanadi, the Kaveri, and the Krishna, which also drain into the Bay of Bengal;[189] and the Narmada and the Tapti, which drain into the Arabian Sea.[190] Coastal features include the marshy Rann of Kutch of western India and the alluvial Sundarbans delta of eastern India; the latter is shared with Bangladesh.[191] India has two archipelagos: the Lakshadweep, coral atolls off India's south-western coast; and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, a volcanic chain in the Andaman Sea.[192] Indian climate is strongly influenced by the Himalayas and the Thar Desert, both of which drive the economically and culturally pivotal summer and winter monsoons.[193] The Himalayas prevent cold Central Asian katabatic winds from blowing in, keeping the bulk of the Indian subcontinent warmer than most locations at similar latitudes.[194][195] The Thar Desert plays a crucial role in attracting the moisture-laden south-west summer monsoon winds that, between June and October, provide the majority of India's rainfall.[193] Four major climatic groupings predominate in India: tropical wet, tropical dry, subtropical humid, and montane.[196] Temperatures in India have risen by 0.7 °C (1.3 °F) between 1901 and 2018.[197] Climate change in India is often thought to be the cause. The retreat of Himalayan glaciers has adversely affected the flow rate of the major Himalayan rivers, including the Ganges and the Brahmaputra.[198] According to some current projections, the number and severity of droughts in India will have markedly increased by the end of the present century.[199] Biodiversity Main articles: Forestry in India and Wildlife of India India has the majority of the world's wild tigers, approximately 3,170 in 2022.[200] A Chital (Axis axis) stag in the Nagarhole National Park in a region covered by a moderately dense[n] forest. India is a megadiverse country, a term employed for 17 countries which display high biological diversity and contain many species exclusively indigenous, or endemic, to them.[201] India is a habitat for 8.6% of all mammal species, 13.7% of bird species, 7.9% of reptile species, 6% of amphibian species, 12.2% of fish species, and 6.0% of all flowering plant species.[202][203] Fully a third of Indian plant species are endemic.[204] India also contains four of the world's 34 biodiversity hotspots,[73] or regions that display significant habitat loss in the presence of high endemism.[o][205] According to official statistics, India's forest cover is 713,789 km2 (275,595 sq mi), which is 21.71% of the country's total land area.[74] It can be subdivided further into broad categories of canopy density, or the proportion of the area of a forest covered by its tree canopy.[206] Very dense forest, whose canopy density is greater than 70%, occupies 3.02% of India's land area.[206][207] It predominates in the tropical moist forest of the Andaman Islands, the Western Ghats, and Northeast India. Moderately dense forest, whose canopy density is between 40% and 70%, occupies 9.39% of India's land area.[206][207] It predominates in the temperate coniferous forest of the Himalayas, the moist deciduous sal forest of eastern India, and the dry deciduous teak forest of central and southern India.[208] Open forest, whose canopy density is between 10% and 40%, occupies 9.26% of India's land area.[206][207] India has two natural zones of thorn forest, one in the Deccan Plateau, immediately east of the Western Ghats, and the other in the western part of the Indo-Gangetic plain, now turned into rich agricultural land by irrigation, its features no longer visible.[209] Among the Indian subcontinent's notable indigenous trees are the astringent Azadirachta indica, or neem, which is widely used in rural Indian herbal medicine,[210] and the luxuriant Ficus religiosa, or peepul,[211] which is displayed on the ancient seals of Mohenjo-daro,[212] and under which the Buddha is recorded in the Pali canon to have sought enlightenment.[213] Many Indian species have descended from those of Gondwana, the southern supercontinent from which India separated more than 100 million years ago.[214] India's subsequent collision with Eurasia set off a mass exchange of species. However, volcanism and climatic changes later caused the extinction of many endemic Indian forms.[215] Still later, mammals entered India from Asia through two zoogeographical passes flanking the Himalayas.[216] This had the effect of lowering endemism among India's mammals, which stands at 12.6%, contrasting with 45.8% among reptiles and 55.8% among amphibians.[203] Among endemics are the vulnerable[217] hooded leaf monkey[218] and the threatened[219] Beddome's toad[219][220] of the Western Ghats. The last three Asiatic cheetahs (on record) in India were shot dead in 1948 in Surguja district, Madhya Pradesh, Central India by Maharajah Ramanuj Pratap Singh Deo. The young males, all from the same litter, were sitting together when they were shot at night. India contains 172 IUCN-designated threatened animal species, or 2.9% of endangered forms.[221] These include the endangered Bengal tiger and the Ganges river dolphin. Critically endangered species include: the gharial, a crocodilian; the great Indian bustard; and the Indian white-rumped vulture, which has become nearly extinct by having ingested the carrion of diclofenac-treated cattle.[222] Before they were extensively utilized for agriculture and cleared for human settlement, the thorn forests of Punjab were mingled at intervals with open grasslands that were grazed by large herds of blackbuck preyed on by the Asiatic cheetah; the blackbuck, no longer extant in Punjab, is now severely endangered in India, and the cheetah is extinct.[223] The pervasive and ecologically devastating human encroachment of recent decades has critically endangered Indian wildlife. In response, the system of national parks and protected areas, first established in 1935, was expanded substantially. In 1972, India enacted the Wildlife Protection Act[224] and Project Tiger to safeguard crucial wilderness; the Forest Conservation Act was enacted in 1980 and amendments added in 1988.[225] India hosts more than five hundred wildlife sanctuaries and eighteen biosphere reserves,[226] four of which are part of the World Network of Biosphere Reserves; seventy-five wetlands are registered under the Ramsar Convention.[227] Politics and government Politics Main article: Politics of India As part of Janadesh 2007, 25,000 pro-land reform landless people in Madhya Pradesh listen to Rajagopal P. V.[228] A parliamentary republic with a multi-party system,[229] it has six recognised national parties, including the Indian National Congress (INC) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and more than 50 regional parties.[230] The Congress is considered centre-left in Indian political culture,[231] and the BJP right-wing.[232][233][234] For most of the period between 1950—when India first became a republic—and the late 1980s, the Congress held a majority in the Parliament. Since then, however, it has increasingly shared the political stage with the BJP,[235] as well as with powerful regional parties which have often forced the creation of multi-party coalition governments at the centre.[236] In the Republic of India's first three general elections, in 1951, 1957, and 1962, the Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru-led Congress won easy victories. On Nehru's death in 1964, Lal Bahadur Shastri briefly became prime minister; he was succeeded, after his own unexpected death in 1966, by Nehru's daughter Indira Gandhi, who went on to lead the Congress to election victories in 1967 and 1971. Following public discontent with the state of emergency she declared in 1975, the Congress was voted out of power in 1977; the then-new Janata Party, which had opposed the emergency, was voted in. Its government lasted just over two years. There were two prime ministers during this period; Morarji Desai and Charan Singh. Voted back into power in 1980, the Congress saw a change in leadership in 1984, when Indira Gandhi was assassinated; she was succeeded by her son Rajiv Gandhi, who won an easy victory in the general elections later that year. The Congress was voted out again in 1989 when a National Front coalition, led by the newly formed Janata Dal in alliance with the Left Front, won the elections; that government too proved relatively short-lived, lasting just under two years. There were two prime ministers during this period; V.P. Singh and Chandra Shekhar.[237] Elections were held again in 1991; no party won an absolute majority. The Congress, as the largest single party, was able to form a minority government led by P. V. Narasimha Rao.[238] US president Barack Obama addresses the members of the Parliament of India in New Delhi in November 2010. A two-year period of political turmoil followed the general election of 1996. Several short-lived alliances shared power at the centre. The BJP formed a government briefly in 1996; it was followed by two comparatively long-lasting United Front coalitions, which depended on external support. There were two prime ministers during this period; H.D. Deve Gowda and I.K. Gujral. In 1998, the BJP was able to form a successful coalition, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). Led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the NDA became the first non-Congress, coalition government to complete a five-year term.[239] Again in the 2004 Indian general elections, no party won an absolute majority, but the Congress emerged as the largest single party, forming another successful coalition: the United Progressive Alliance (UPA). It had the support of left-leaning parties and MPs who opposed the BJP. The UPA returned to power in the 2009 general election with increased numbers, and it no longer required external support from India's communist parties.[240] That year, Manmohan Singh became the first prime minister since Jawaharlal Nehru in 1957 and 1962 to be re-elected to a consecutive five-year term.[241] In the 2014 general election, the BJP became the first political party since 1984 to win a majority and govern without the support of other parties.[242] In the 2019 general election, the BJP was victorious again. The incumbent prime minister is Narendra Modi, a former chief minister of Gujarat. On 22 July 2022, Droupadi Murmu was elected India's 15th president and took the oath of office on 25 July 2022.[243] Government Main articles: Government of India and Constitution of India Rashtrapati Bhavan, the official residence of the President of India, was designed by British architects Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker for the Viceroy of India, and constructed between 1911 and 1931 during the British Raj.[244] India is a federation with a parliamentary system governed under the Constitution of India—the country's supreme legal document. It is a constitutional republic. Its democratic functioning has come into question in recent years, with some stating that it has become a mixed regime or electoral autocracy.[245] Federalism in India defines the power distribution between the union and the states. The Constitution of India, which came into effect on 26 January 1950,[246] originally stated India to be a "sovereign, democratic republic;" this characterisation was amended in 1971 to "a sovereign, socialist, secular, democratic republic".[247] India's form of government, traditionally described as "quasi-federal" with a strong centre and weak states,[248] has grown increasingly federal since the late 1990s as a result of political, economic, and social changes.[249][250] National symbols[1] Flag of India Emblem Sarnath Lion Capital Anthem Jana Gana Mana Song "Vande Mataram" Language None[9][10][11] Currency ₹ (Indian rupee) Calendar Saka Bird Indian peafowl Flower Lotus Fruit Mango Mammal Bengal tiger River dolphin Tree Banyan River Ganges The Government of India comprises three branches:[251] Executive: The President of India is the ceremonial head of state,[252] who is elected indirectly for a five-year term by an electoral college comprising members of national and state legislatures.[253][254] The Prime Minister of India is the head of government and exercises most executive power.[255] Appointed by the president,[256] the prime minister is by convention supported by the party or political alliance having a majority of seats in the lower house of parliament.[255] The executive of the Indian government consists of the president, the vice president, and the Union Council of Ministers—with the cabinet being its executive committee—headed by the prime minister. Any minister holding a portfolio must be a member of one of the houses of parliament.[252] In the Indian parliamentary system, the executive is subordinate to the legislature; the prime minister and their council are directly responsible to the lower house of the parliament. Civil servants act as permanent executives and all decisions of the executive are implemented by them.[257] Legislature: The legislature of India is the bicameral parliament. Operating under a Westminster-style parliamentary system, it comprises an upper house called the Rajya Sabha (Council of States) and a lower house called the Lok Sabha (House of the People).[258] The Rajya Sabha is a permanent body of 245 members who serve staggered six-year terms.[259] Most are elected indirectly by the state and union territorial legislatures in numbers proportional to their state's share of the national population.[256] All but two of the Lok Sabha's 545 members are elected directly by popular vote; they represent single-member constituencies for five-year terms.[260] Two seats of parliament, reserved for Anglo-Indians in the article 331, have been scrapped.[261][262] Judiciary: India has a three-tier unitary independent judiciary[263] comprising the supreme court, headed by the Chief Justice of India, 25 high courts, and a large number of trial courts.[263] The supreme court has original jurisdiction over cases involving fundamental rights and over disputes between states and the centre and has appellate jurisdiction over the high courts.[264] It has the power to both strike down union or state laws which contravene the constitution[265] and invalidate any government action it deems unconstitutional.[266] Administrative divisions Main article: Administrative divisions of India See also: Political integration of India India is a federal union comprising 28 states and 8 union territories.[16] All states, as well as the union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, Puducherry and the National Capital Territory of Delhi, have elected legislatures and governments following the Westminster system of governance. The remaining five union territories are directly ruled by the central government through appointed administrators. In 1956, under the States Reorganisation Act, states were reorganised on a linguistic basis.[267] There are over a quarter of a million local government bodies at city, town, block, district and village levels.[268] A clickable map of the 28 states and 8 union territories of India States Andhra Pradesh Arunachal Pradesh Assam Bihar Chhattisgarh Goa Gujarat Haryana Himachal Pradesh Jharkhand Karnataka Kerala Madhya Pradesh Maharashtra Manipur Meghalaya Mizoram Nagaland Odisha Punjab Rajasthan Sikkim Tamil Nadu Telangana Tripura Uttar Pradesh Uttarakhand West Bengal Union territories Andaman and Nicobar Islands Chandigarh Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu Jammu and Kashmir Ladakh Lakshadweep National Capital Territory of Delhi Puducherry Foreign, economic and strategic relations Main articles: Foreign relations of India and Indian Armed Forces During the 1950s and 60s, India played a pivotal role in the Non-Aligned Movement.[269] From left to right: Gamal Abdel Nasser of United Arab Republic (now Egypt), Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia and Jawaharlal Nehru in Belgrade, September 1961. In the 1950s, India strongly supported decolonisation in Africa and Asia and played a leading role in the Non-Aligned Movement.[270] After initially cordial relations with neighbouring China, India went to war with China in 1962 and was widely thought to have been humiliated.[271] This was followed by another military conflict in 1967 in which India successfully repelled Chinese attack.[272] India has had tense relations with neighbouring Pakistan; the two nations have gone to war four times: in 1947, 1965, 1971, and 1999. Three of these wars were fought over the disputed territory of Kashmir, while the third, the 1971 war, followed from India's support for the independence of Bangladesh.[273] In the late 1980s, the Indian military twice intervened abroad at the invitation of the host country: a peace-keeping operation in Sri Lanka between 1987 and 1990; and an armed intervention to prevent a 1988 coup d'état attempt in the Maldives. After the 1965 war with Pakistan, India began to pursue close military and economic ties with the Soviet Union; by the late 1960s, the Soviet Union was its largest arms supplier.[274] Aside from ongoing its special relationship with Russia,[275] India has wide-ranging defence relations with Israel and France. In recent years, it has played key roles in the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation and the World Trade Organization. The nation has provided 100,000 military and police personnel to serve in 35 UN peacekeeping operations across four continents. It participates in the East Asia Summit, the G8+5, and other multilateral forums.[276] India has close economic ties with countries in South America,[277] Asia, and Africa; it pursues a "Look East" policy that seeks to strengthen partnerships with the ASEAN nations, Japan, and South Korea that revolve around many issues, but especially those involving economic investment and regional security.[278][279] The Indian Air Force contingent marching at the 221st Bastille Day military parade in Paris, on 14 July 2009. The parade at which India was the foreign guest was led by India's oldest regiment, the Maratha Light Infantry, founded in 1768.[280] China's nuclear test of 1964, as well as its repeated threats to intervene in support of Pakistan in the 1965 war, convinced India to develop nuclear weapons.[281] India conducted its first nuclear weapons test in 1974 and carried out additional underground testing in 1998. Despite criticism and military sanctions, India has signed neither the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty nor the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, considering both to be flawed and discriminatory.[282] India maintains a "no first use" nuclear policy and is developing a nuclear triad capability as a part of its "Minimum Credible Deterrence" doctrine.[283][284] It is developing a ballistic missile defence shield and, a fifth-generation fighter jet.[285][286] Other indigenous military projects involve the design and implementation of Vikrant-class aircraft carriers and Arihant-class nuclear submarines.[287] Since the end of the Cold War, India has increased its economic, strategic, and military co-operation with the United States and the European Union.[288] In 2008, a civilian nuclear agreement was signed between India and the United States. Although India possessed nuclear weapons at the time and was not a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, it received waivers from the International Atomic Energy Agency and the Nuclear Suppliers Group, ending earlier restrictions on India's nuclear technology and commerce. As a consequence, India became the sixth de facto nuclear weapons state.[289] India subsequently signed co-operation agreements involving civilian nuclear energy with Russia,[290] France,[291] the United Kingdom,[292] and Canada.[293] Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India (left, background) in talks with President Enrique Peña Nieto of Mexico during a visit to Mexico, 2016 The President of India is the supreme commander of the nation's armed forces; with 1.45 million active troops, they compose the world's second-largest military. It comprises the Indian Army, the Indian Navy, the Indian Air Force, and the Indian Coast Guard.[294] The official Indian defence budget for 2011 was US$36.03 billion, or 1.83% of GDP.[295] Defence expenditure was pegged at US$70.12 billion for fiscal year 2022–23 and, increased 9.8% than previous fiscal year.[296][297] India is the world's second largest arms importer; between 2016 and 2020, it accounted for 9.5% of the total global arms imports.[298] Much of the military expenditure was focused on defence against Pakistan and countering growing Chinese influence in the Indian Ocean.[299] In May 2017, the Indian Space Research Organisation launched the South Asia Satellite, a gift from India to its neighbouring SAARC countries.[300] In October 2018, India signed a US$5.43 billion (over ₹400 billion) agreement with Russia to procure four S-400 Triumf surface-to-air missile defence systems, Russia's most advanced long-range missile defence system.[301] Economy Main article: Economy of India A farmer in northwestern Karnataka ploughs his field with a tractor even as another in a field beyond does the same with a pair of oxen. In 2019, 43% of India's total workforce was employed in agriculture.[302] India is the world's largest producer of milk, with the largest population of cattle. In 2018, nearly 80% of India's milk was sourced from small farms with herd size between one and two, the milk harvested by hand milking.[304] Women tend to a recently planted rice field in Junagadh district in Gujarat. 55% of India's female workforce was employed in agriculture in 2019.[303] According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Indian economy in 2022 was nominally worth $3.46 trillion; it was the fifth-largest economy by market exchange rates, and is around $11.6 trillion, the third-largest by purchasing power parity (PPP).[305] With its average annual GDP growth rate of 5.8% over the past two decades, and reaching 6.1% during 2011–2012,[306] India is one of the world's fastest-growing economies.[307] However, the country ranks 139th in the world in nominal GDP per capita and 118th in GDP per capita at PPP.[308] Until 1991, all Indian governments followed protectionist policies that were influenced by socialist economics. Widespread state intervention and regulation largely walled the economy off from the outside world. An acute balance of payments crisis in 1991 forced the nation to liberalise its economy;[309] since then, it has moved increasingly towards a free-market system[310][311] by emphasising both foreign trade and direct investment inflows.[312] India has been a member of World Trade Organization since 1 January 1995.[313] The 522-million-worker Indian labour force is the world's second-largest, as of 2017.[294] The service sector makes up 55.6% of GDP, the industrial sector 26.3% and the agricultural sector 18.1%. India's foreign exchange remittances of US$100 billion in 2022,[314] highest in the world, were contributed to its economy by 32 million Indians working in foreign countries.[315] Major agricultural products include: rice, wheat, oilseed, cotton, jute, tea, sugarcane, and potatoes.[16] Major industries include: textiles, telecommunications, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, food processing, steel, transport equipment, cement, mining, petroleum, machinery, and software.[16] In 2006, the share of external trade in India's GDP stood at 24%, up from 6% in 1985.[310] In 2008, India's share of world trade was 1.68%;[316] In 2021, India was the world's ninth-largest importer and the sixteenth-largest exporter.[317] Major exports include: petroleum products, textile goods, jewellery, software, engineering goods, chemicals, and manufactured leather goods.[16] Major imports include: crude oil, machinery, gems, fertiliser, and chemicals.[16] Between 2001 and 2011, the contribution of petrochemical and engineering goods to total exports grew from 14% to 42%.[318] India was the world's second largest textile exporter after China in the 2013 calendar year.[319] Averaging an economic growth rate of 7.5% for several years prior to 2007,[310] India has more than doubled its hourly wage rates during the first decade of the 21st century.[320] Some 431 million Indians have left poverty since 1985; India's middle classes are projected to number around 580 million by 2030.[321] Though ranking 68th in global competitiveness,[322] as of 2010, India ranks 17th in financial market sophistication, 24th in the banking sector, 44th in business sophistication, and 39th in innovation, ahead of several advanced economies.[323] With seven of the world's top 15 information technology outsourcing companies based in India, as of 2009, the country is viewed as the second-most favourable outsourcing destination after the United States.[324] India is ranked 40th in the Global Innovation Index in 2022.[325] India's consumer market, the world's eleventh-largest, is expected to become fifth-largest by 2030.[321] Driven by growth, India's nominal GDP per capita increased steadily from US$308 in 1991, when economic liberalisation began, to US$1,380 in 2010, to an estimated US$1,730 in 2016. It is expected to grow to US$2,466 by 2022.[20] However, it has remained lower than those of other Asian developing countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, and is expected to remain so in the near future. A panorama of Bangalore, the centre of India's software development economy. In the 1980s, when the first multinational corporations began to set up centres in India, they chose Bangalore because of the large pool of skilled graduates in the area, in turn due to the many science and engineering colleges in the surrounding region.[326] According to a 2011 PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) report, India's GDP at purchasing power parity could overtake that of the United States by 2045.[327] During the next four decades, Indian GDP is expected to grow at an annualised average of 8%, making it potentially the world's fastest-growing major economy until 2050.[327] The report highlights key growth factors: a young and rapidly growing working-age population; growth in the manufacturing sector because of rising education and engineering skill levels; and sustained growth of the consumer market driven by a rapidly growing middle-class.[327] The World Bank cautions that, for India to achieve its economic potential, it must continue to focus on public sector reform, transport infrastructure, agricultural and rural development, removal of labour regulations, education, energy security, and public health and nutrition.[328] According to the Worldwide Cost of Living Report 2017 released by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) which was created by comparing more than 400 individual prices across 160 products and services, four of the cheapest cities were in India: Bangalore (3rd), Mumbai (5th), Chennai (5th) and New Delhi (8th).[329] Industries A tea garden in Sikkim. India, the world's second largest-producer of tea, is a nation of one billion tea drinkers, who consume 70% of India's tea output. India's telecommunication industry is the second-largest in the world with over 1.2 billion subscribers. It contributes 6.5% to India's GDP.[330] After the third quarter of 2017, India surpassed the US to become the second largest smartphone market in the world after China.[331] The Indian automotive industry, the world's second-fastest growing, increased domestic sales by 26% during 2009–2010,[332] and exports by 36% during 2008–2009.[333] In 2022, India became the world's third-largest vehicle market after China and the United States, surpassing Japan.[334] At the end of 2011, the Indian IT industry employed 2.8 million professionals, generated revenues close to US$100 billion equalling 7.5% of Indian GDP, and contributed 26% of India's merchandise exports.[335] The pharmaceutical industry in India emerged as a global player. As of 2021, with 3000 pharmaceutical companies and 10,500 manufacturing units India is the world's third-largest pharmaceutical producer, largest producer of generic medicines and supply up to 50—60% of global vaccines demand, these all contribute up to US$24.44 billions in exports and India's local pharmaceutical market is estimated up to US$42 billion.[336][337] India is among the top 12 biotech destinations in the world.[338][339] The Indian biotech industry grew by 15.1% in 2012–2013, increasing its revenues from ₹204.4 billion (Indian rupees) to ₹235.24 billion (US$3.94 billion at June 2013 exchange rates).[340] Energy Main articles: Energy in India and Energy policy of India India's capacity to generate electrical power is 300 gigawatts, of which 42 gigawatts is renewable.[341] The country's usage of coal is a major cause of greenhouse gas emissions by India but its renewable energy is competing strongly.[342] India emits about 7% of global greenhouse gas emissions. This equates to about 2.5 tons of carbon dioxide per person per year, which is half the world average.[343][344] Increasing access to electricity and clean cooking with liquefied petroleum gas have been priorities for energy in India.[345] Socio-economic challenges Health workers about to begin another day of immunisation against infectious diseases in 2006. Eight years later, and three years after India's last case of polio, the World Health Organization declared India to be polio-free.[346] Despite economic growth during recent decades, India continues to face socio-economic challenges. In 2006, India contained the largest number of people living below the World Bank's international poverty line of US$1.25 per day.[347] The proportion decreased from 60% in 1981 to 42% in 2005.[348] Under the World Bank's later revised poverty line, it was 21% in 2011.[p][350] 30.7% of India's children under the age of five are underweight.[351] According to a Food and Agriculture Organization report in 2015, 15% of the population is undernourished.[352][353] The Mid-Day Meal Scheme attempts to lower these rates.[354] A 2018 Walk Free Foundation report estimated that nearly 8 million people in India were living in different forms of modern slavery, such as bonded labour, child labour, human trafficking, and forced begging, among others.[355] According to the 2011 census, there were 10.1 million child labourers in the country, a decline of 2.6 million from 12.6 million in 2001.[356] Since 1991, economic inequality between India's states has consistently grown: the per-capita net state domestic product of the richest states in 2007 was 3.2 times that of the poorest.[357] Corruption in India is perceived to have decreased. According to the Corruption Perceptions Index, India ranked 78th out of 180 countries in 2018 with a score of 41 out of 100, an improvement from 85th in 2014.[358][359] Epidemic and pandemic diseases have long been a major factor, including COVID-19 recently.[360] Demographics, languages, and religion Main articles: Demographics of India, Languages of India, and Religion in India See also: South Asian ethnic groups India by language The language families of South Asia With 1,210,193,422 residents reported in the 2011 provisional census report,[361] India was the world's second-most populous country.[q] Its population grew by 17.64% from 2001 to 2011,[363] compared to 21.54% growth in the previous decade (1991–2001).[363] The human sex ratio, according to the 2011 census, is 940 females per 1,000 males.[361] The median age was 28.7 as of 2020.[294] The first post-colonial census, conducted in 1951, counted 361 million people.[364] Medical advances made in the last 50 years as well as increased agricultural productivity brought about by the "Green Revolution" have caused India's population to grow rapidly.[365] The life expectancy in India is at 70 years—71.5 years for women, 68.7 years for men.[294] There are around 93 physicians per 100,000 people.[366] Migration from rural to urban areas has been an important dynamic in India's recent history. The number of people living in urban areas grew by 31.2% between 1991 and 2001.[367] Yet, in 2001, over 70% still lived in rural areas.[368][369] The level of urbanisation increased further from 27.81% in the 2001 Census to 31.16% in the 2011 Census. The slowing down of the overall population growth rate was due to the sharp decline in the growth rate in rural areas since 1991.[370] According to the 2011 census, there are 53 million-plus urban agglomerations in India; among them Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad, in decreasing order by population.[371] The literacy rate in 2011 was 74.04%: 65.46% among females and 82.14% among males.[372] The rural-urban literacy gap, which was 21.2 percentage points in 2001, dropped to 16.1 percentage points in 2011. The improvement in the rural literacy rate is twice that of urban areas.[370] Kerala is the most literate state with 93.91% literacy; while Bihar the least with 63.82%.[372] The interior of San Thome Basilica, Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Christianity is believed to have been introduced to India by the late 2nd century by Syriac-speaking Christians. Among speakers of the Indian languages, 74% speak Indo-Aryan languages, the easternmost branch of the Indo-European languages; 24% speak Dravidian languages, indigenous to South Asia and spoken widely before the spread of Indo-Aryan languages and 2% speak Austroasiatic languages or the Sino-Tibetan languages. India has no national language.[373] Hindi, with the largest number of speakers, is the official language of the government.[374][375] English is used extensively in business and administration and has the status of a "subsidiary official language";[6] it is important in education, especially as a medium of higher education. Each state and union territory has one or more official languages, and the constitution recognises in particular 22 "scheduled languages". The 2011 census reported the religion in India with the largest number of followers was Hinduism (79.80% of the population), followed by Islam (14.23%); the remaining were Christianity (2.30%), Sikhism (1.72%), Buddhism (0.70%), Jainism (0.36%) and others[r] (0.9%).[15] India has the third-largest Muslim population—the largest for a non-Muslim majority country.[376][377] Culture Main article: Culture of India A Sikh pilgrim at the Harmandir Sahib, or Golden Temple, in Amritsar, Punjab Indian cultural history spans more than 4,500 years.[378] During the Vedic period (c. 1700 BCE – c. 500 BCE), the foundations of Hindu philosophy, mythology, theology and literature were laid, and many beliefs and practices which still exist today, such as dhárma, kárma, yóga, and mokṣa, were established.[78] India is notable for its religious diversity, with Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Islam, Christianity, and Jainism among the nation's major religions.[379] The predominant religion, Hinduism, has been shaped by various historical schools of thought, including those of the Upanishads,[380] the Yoga Sutras, the Bhakti movement,[379] and by Buddhist philosophy.[381] Visual art Main article: Indian art India has a very ancient tradition of art, which has exchanged many influences with the rest of Eurasia, especially in the first millennium, when Buddhist art spread with Indian religions to Central, East and South-East Asia, the last also greatly influenced by Hindu art.[382] Thousands of seals from the Indus Valley Civilization of the third millennium BCE have been found, usually carved with animals, but a few with human figures. The "Pashupati" seal, excavated in Mohenjo-daro, Pakistan, in 1928–29, is the best known.[383][384] After this there is a long period with virtually nothing surviving.[384][385] Almost all surviving ancient Indian art thereafter is in various forms of religious sculpture in durable materials, or coins. There was probably originally far more in wood, which is lost. In north India Mauryan art is the first imperial movement.[386][387][388] In the first millennium CE, Buddhist art spread with Indian religions to Central, East and South-East Asia, the last also greatly influenced by Hindu art.[389] Over the following centuries a distinctly Indian style of sculpting the human figure developed, with less interest in articulating precise anatomy than ancient Greek sculpture but showing smoothly-flowing forms expressing prana ("breath" or life-force).[390][391] This is often complicated by the need to give figures multiple arms or heads, or represent different genders on the left and right of figures, as with the Ardhanarishvara form of Shiva and Parvati.[392][393] Most of the earliest large sculpture is Buddhist, either excavated from Buddhist stupas such as Sanchi, Sarnath and Amaravati,[394] or is rock cut reliefs at sites such as Ajanta, Karla and Ellora. Hindu and Jain sites appear rather later.[395][396] In spite of this complex mixture of religious traditions, generally, the prevailing artistic style at any time and place has been shared by the major religious groups, and sculptors probably usually served all communities.[397] Gupta art, at its peak c. 300 CE – c. 500 CE, is often regarded as a classical period whose influence lingered for many centuries after; it saw a new dominance of Hindu sculpture, as at the Elephanta Caves.[398][399] Across the north, this became rather stiff and formulaic after c. 800 CE, though rich with finely carved detail in the surrounds of statues.[400] But in the South, under the Pallava and Chola dynasties, sculpture in both stone and bronze had a sustained period of great achievement; the large bronzes with Shiva as Nataraja have become an iconic symbol of India.[401][402] Ancient painting has only survived at a few sites, of which the crowded scenes of court life in the Ajanta Caves are by far the most important, but it was evidently highly developed, and is mentioned as a courtly accomplishment in Gupta times.[403][404] Painted manuscripts of religious texts survive from Eastern India about the 10th century onwards, most of the earliest being Buddhist and later Jain. No doubt the style of these was used in larger paintings.[405] The Persian-derived Deccan painting, starting just before the Mughal miniature, between them give the first large body of secular painting, with an emphasis on portraits, and the recording of princely pleasures and wars.[406][407] The style spread to Hindu courts, especially among the Rajputs, and developed a variety of styles, with the smaller courts often the most innovative, with figures such as Nihâl Chand and Nainsukh.[408][409] As a market developed among European residents, it was supplied by Company painting by Indian artists with considerable Western influence.[410][411] In the 19th century, cheap Kalighat paintings of gods and everyday life, done on paper, were urban folk art from Calcutta, which later saw the Bengal School of Art, reflecting the art colleges founded by the British, the first movement in modern Indian painting.[412][413] Bhutesvara Yakshis, Buddhist reliefs from Mathura, 2nd century CE Bhutesvara Yakshis, Buddhist reliefs from Mathura, 2nd century CE   Gupta terracotta relief, Krishna Killing the Horse Demon Keshi, 5th century Gupta terracotta relief, Krishna Killing the Horse Demon Keshi, 5th century   Elephanta Caves, triple-bust (trimurti) of Shiva, 18 feet (5.5 m) tall, c. 550 Elephanta Caves, triple-bust (trimurti) of Shiva, 18 feet (5.5 m) tall, c. 550   Chola bronze of Shiva as Nataraja ("Lord of Dance"), Tamil Nadu, 10th or 11th century Chola bronze of Shiva as Nataraja ("Lord of Dance"), Tamil Nadu, 10th or 11th century   Jahangir Receives Prince Khurram at Ajmer on His Return from the Mewar Campaign, Balchand, c. 1635 Jahangir Receives Prince Khurram at Ajmer on His Return from the Mewar Campaign, Balchand, c. 1635   Krishna Fluting to the Milkmaids, Kangra painting, 1775–1785 Krishna Fluting to the Milkmaids, Kangra painting, 1775–1785 Architecture Main article: Architecture of India The Taj Mahal from across the Yamuna river showing two outlying red sandstone buildings, a mosque on the right (west) and a jawab (response) thought to have been built for architectural balance Much of Indian architecture, including the Taj Mahal, other works of Indo-Islamic Mughal architecture, and South Indian architecture, blends ancient local traditions with imported styles.[414] Vernacular architecture is also regional in its flavours. Vastu shastra, literally "science of construction" or "architecture" and ascribed to Mamuni Mayan,[415] explores how the laws of nature affect human dwellings;[416] it employs precise geometry and directional alignments to reflect perceived cosmic constructs.[417] As applied in Hindu temple architecture, it is influenced by the Shilpa Shastras, a series of foundational texts whose basic mythological form is the Vastu-Purusha mandala, a square that embodied the "absolute".[418] The Taj Mahal, built in Agra between 1631 and 1648 by orders of Mughal emperor Shah Jahan in memory of his wife, has been described in the UNESCO World Heritage List as "the jewel of Muslim art in India and one of the universally admired masterpieces of the world's heritage".[419] Indo-Saracenic Revival architecture, developed by the British in the late 19th century, drew on Indo-Islamic architecture.[420] Literature Main article: Indian literature The earliest literature in India, composed between 1500 BCE and 1200 CE, was in the Sanskrit language.[421] Major works of Sanskrit literature include the Rigveda (c. 1500 BCE – c. 1200 BCE), the epics: Mahābhārata (c. 400 BCE – c. 400 CE) and the Ramayana (c. 300 BCE and later); Abhijñānaśākuntalam (The Recognition of Śakuntalā, and other dramas of Kālidāsa (c. 5th century CE) and Mahākāvya poetry.[422][423][424] In Tamil literature, the Sangam literature (c. 600 BCE – c. 300 BCE) consisting of 2,381 poems, composed by 473 poets, is the earliest work.[425][426][427][428] From the 14th to the 18th centuries, India's literary traditions went through a period of drastic change because of the emergence of devotional poets like Kabīr, Tulsīdās, and Guru Nānak. This period was characterised by a varied and wide spectrum of thought and expression; as a consequence, medieval Indian literary works differed significantly from classical traditions.[429] In the 19th century, Indian writers took a new interest in social questions and psychological descriptions. In the 20th century, Indian literature was influenced by the works of the Bengali poet, author and philosopher Rabindranath Tagore,[430] who was a recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature. Performing arts and media Main articles: Music of India, Dance in India, Cinema of India, and Television in India India's National Academy of Performance Arts has recognised eight Indian dance styles to be classical. One such is Kuchipudi shown here. Indian music ranges over various traditions and regional styles. Classical music encompasses two genres and their various folk offshoots: the northern Hindustani and the southern Carnatic schools.[431] Regionalised popular forms include filmi and folk music; the syncretic tradition of the bauls is a well-known form of the latter. Indian dance also features diverse folk and classical forms. Among the better-known folk dances are: bhangra of Punjab, bihu of Assam, Jhumair and chhau of Jharkhand, Odisha and West Bengal, garba and dandiya of Gujarat, ghoomar of Rajasthan, and lavani of Maharashtra. Eight dance forms, many with narrative forms and mythological elements, have been accorded classical dance status by India's National Academy of Music, Dance, and Drama. These are: bharatanatyam of the state of Tamil Nadu, kathak of Uttar Pradesh, kathakali and mohiniyattam of Kerala, kuchipudi of Andhra Pradesh, manipuri of Manipur, odissi of Odisha, and the sattriya of Assam.[432] Theatre in India melds music, dance, and improvised or written dialogue.[433] Often based on Hindu mythology, but also borrowing from medieval romances or social and political events, Indian theatre includes: the bhavai of Gujarat, the jatra of West Bengal, the nautanki and ramlila of North India, tamasha of Maharashtra, burrakatha of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, terukkuttu of Tamil Nadu, and the yakshagana of Karnataka.[434] India has a theatre training institute the National School of Drama (NSD) that is situated at New Delhi It is an autonomous organisation under the Ministry of culture, Government of India.[435] The Indian film industry produces the world's most-watched cinema.[436] Established regional cinematic traditions exist in the Assamese, Bengali, Bhojpuri, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Punjabi, Gujarati, Marathi, Odia, Tamil, and Telugu languages.[437] The Hindi language film industry (Bollywood) is the largest sector representing 43% of box office revenue, followed by the South Indian Telugu and Tamil film industries which represent 36% combined.[438] Television broadcasting began in India in 1959 as a state-run medium of communication and expanded slowly for more than two decades.[439][440] The state monopoly on television broadcast ended in the 1990s. Since then, satellite channels have increasingly shaped the popular culture of Indian society.[441] Today, television is the most penetrative media in India; industry estimates indicate that as of 2012 there are over 554 million TV consumers, 462 million with satellite or cable connections compared to other forms of mass media such as the press (350 million), radio (156 million) or internet (37 million).[442] Society Muslims offer namaz at a mosque in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir. Traditional Indian society is sometimes defined by social hierarchy. The Indian caste system embodies much of the social stratification and many of the social restrictions found on the Indian subcontinent. Social classes are defined by thousands of endogamous hereditary groups, often termed as jātis, or "castes".[443] India abolished untouchability in 1950 with the adoption of the constitution and has since enacted other anti-discriminatory laws and social welfare initiatives. Family values are important in the Indian tradition, and multi-generational patrilineal joint families have been the norm in India, though nuclear families are becoming common in urban areas.[444] An overwhelming majority of Indians, with their consent, have their marriages arranged by their parents or other family elders.[445] Marriage is thought to be for life,[445] and the divorce rate is extremely low,[446] with less than one in a thousand marriages ending in divorce.[447] Child marriages are common, especially in rural areas; many women wed before reaching 18, which is their legal marriageable age.[448] Female infanticide in India, and lately female foeticide, have created skewed gender ratios; the number of missing women in the country quadrupled from 15 million to 63 million in the 50-year period ending in 2014, faster than the population growth during the same period, and constituting 20 percent of India's female electorate.[449] According to an Indian government study, an additional 21 million girls are unwanted and do not receive adequate care.[450] Despite a government ban on sex-selective foeticide, the practice remains commonplace in India, the result of a preference for boys in a patriarchal society.[451] The payment of dowry, although illegal, remains widespread across class lines.[452] Deaths resulting from dowry, mostly from bride burning, are on the rise, despite stringent anti-dowry laws.[453] Many Indian festivals are religious in origin. The best known include: Diwali, Ganesh Chaturthi, Thai Pongal, Holi, Durga Puja, Eid ul-Fitr, Bakr-Id, Christmas, and Vaisakhi.[454][455] Education Main articles: Education in India, Literacy in India, and History of education in the Indian subcontinent Children awaiting school lunch in Rayka (also Raika), a village in rural Gujarat. The salutation Jai Bhim written on the blackboard honours the jurist, social reformer, and Dalit leader B. R. Ambedkar. In the 2011 census, about 73% of the population was literate, with 81% for men and 65% for women. This compares to 1981 when the respective rates were 41%, 53% and 29%. In 1951 the rates were 18%, 27% and 9%. In 1921 the rates 7%, 12% and 2%. In 1891 they were 5%, 9% and 1%,[456][457] According to Latika Chaudhary, in 1911 there were under three primary schools for every ten villages. Statistically, more caste and religious diversity reduced private spending. Primary schools taught literacy, so local diversity limited its growth.[458] The education system of India is the world's second-largest.[459] India has over 900 universities, 40,000 colleges[460] and 1.5 million schools.[461] In India's higher education system, a significant number of seats are reserved under affirmative action policies for the historically disadvantaged. In recent decades India's improved education system is often cited as one of the main contributors to its economic development.[462][463] Clothing Main article: Clothing in India Women in sari at an adult literacy class in Tamil Nadu A man in dhoti and wearing a woollen shawl, in Varanasi From ancient times until the advent of the modern, the most widely worn traditional dress in India was draped.[464] For women it took the form of a sari, a single piece of cloth many yards long.[464] The sari was traditionally wrapped around the lower body and the shoulder.[464] In its modern form, it is combined with an underskirt, or Indian petticoat, and tucked in the waist band for more secure fastening. It is also commonly worn with an Indian blouse, or choli, which serves as the primary upper-body garment, the sari's end—passing over the shoulder—serving to cover the midriff and obscure the upper body's contours.[464] For men, a similar but shorter length of cloth, the dhoti, has served as a lower-body garment.[465] Women (from left to right) in churidars and kameez (with back to the camera), jeans and sweater, and pink Shalwar kameez The use of stitched clothes became widespread after Muslim rule was established at first by the Delhi sultanate (c. 1300 CE) and then continued by the Mughal Empire (c. 1525 CE).[466] Among the garments introduced during this time and still commonly worn are: the shalwars and pyjamas, both styles of trousers, and the tunics kurta and kameez.[466] In southern India, the traditional draped garments were to see much longer continuous use.[466] Shalwars are atypically wide at the waist but narrow to a cuffed bottom. They are held up by a drawstring, which causes them to become pleated around the waist.[467] The pants can be wide and baggy, or they can be cut quite narrow, on the bias, in which case they are called churidars. When they are ordinarily wide at the waist and their bottoms are hemmed but not cuffed, they are called pyjamas. The kameez is a long shirt or tunic,[468] its side seams left open below the waist-line.[469] The kurta is traditionally collarless and made of cotton or silk; it is worn plain or with embroidered decoration, such as chikan; and typically falls to either just above or just below the wearer's knees.[470] In the last 50 years, fashions have changed a great deal in India. Increasingly, in urban northern India, the sari is no longer the apparel of everyday wear, though they remain popular on formal occasions.[471] The traditional shalwar kameez is rarely worn by younger urban women, who favour churidars or jeans.[471] In white-collar office settings, ubiquitous air conditioning allows men to wear sports jackets year-round.[471] For weddings and formal occasions, men in the middle- and upper classes often wear bandgala, or short Nehru jackets, with pants, with the groom and his groomsmen sporting sherwanis and churidars.[471] The dhoti, once the universal garment of Hindu males, the wearing of which in the homespun and handwoven khadi allowed Gandhi to bring Indian nationalism to the millions,[472] is seldom seen in the cities.[471] Cuisine Main article: Indian cuisine South Indian vegetarian thali, or platter Railway mutton curry from Odisha The foundation of a typical Indian meal is a cereal cooked in a plain fashion and complemented with flavourful savoury dishes.[473] The cooked cereal could be steamed rice; chapati, a thin unleavened bread made from wheat flour, or occasionally cornmeal, and griddle-cooked dry;[474] the idli, a steamed breakfast cake, or dosa, a griddled pancake, both leavened and made from a batter of rice- and gram meal.[475] The savoury dishes might include lentils, pulses and vegetables commonly spiced with ginger and garlic, but also with a combination of spices that may include coriander, cumin, turmeric, cinnamon, cardamon and others as informed by culinary conventions.[473] They might also include poultry, fish, or meat dishes. In some instances, the ingredients might be mixed during the process of cooking.[476] A platter, or thali, used for eating usually has a central place reserved for the cooked cereal, and peripheral ones for the flavourful accompaniments, which are often served in small bowls. The cereal and its accompaniments are eaten simultaneously rather than a piecemeal manner. This is accomplished by mixing—for example of rice and lentils—or folding, wrapping, scooping or dipping—such as chapati and cooked vegetables or lentils.[473] 0:14 A tandoor chef in the Turkman Gate, Old Delhi, makes Khameeri roti (a Muslim-influenced style of leavened bread).[477] India has distinctive vegetarian cuisines, each a feature of the geographical and cultural histories of its adherents.[478] The appearance of ahimsa, or the avoidance of violence toward all forms of life in many religious orders early in Indian history, especially Upanishadic Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism, is thought to have contributed to the predominance of vegetarianism among a large segment of India's Hindu population, especially in southern India, Gujarat, the Hindi-speaking belt of north-central India, as well as among Jains.[478] Although meat is eaten widely in India, the proportional consumption of meat in the overall diet is low.[479] Unlike China, which has increased its per capita meat consumption substantially in its years of increased economic growth, in India the strong dietary traditions have contributed to dairy, rather than meat, becoming the preferred form of animal protein consumption.[480] The most significant import of cooking techniques into India during the last millennium occurred during the Mughal Empire. Dishes such as the pilaf,[481] developed in the Abbasid caliphate,[482] and cooking techniques such as the marinating of meat in yogurt, spread into northern India from regions to its northwest.[483] To the simple yogurt marinade of Persia, onions, garlic, almonds, and spices began to be added in India.[483] Rice was partially cooked and layered alternately with the sauteed meat, the pot sealed tightly, and slow cooked according to another Persian cooking technique, to produce what has today become the Indian biryani,[483] a feature of festive dining in many parts of India.[484] In the food served in Indian restaurants worldwide the diversity of Indian food has been partially concealed by the dominance of Punjabi cuisine. The popularity of tandoori chicken—cooked in the tandoor oven, which had traditionally been used for baking bread in the rural Punjab and the Delhi region, especially among Muslims, but which is originally from Central Asia—dates to the 1950s, and was caused in large part by an entrepreneurial response among people from the Punjab who had been displaced by the 1947 partition of India.[478] Sports and recreation Main article: Sport in India Girls play hopscotch in Jaora, Madhya Pradesh. Hopscotch has been commonly played by girls in rural India.[485] Several traditional indigenous sports such as kabaddi, kho kho, pehlwani and gilli-danda, and also martial arts such as Kalarippayattu and marma adi, remain popular. Chess is commonly held to have originated in India as chaturaṅga;[486] in recent years, there has been a rise in the number of Indian grandmasters.[487] Viswanathan Anand became the Chess World Champion in 2007 and held the status until 2013.[488] Parcheesi is derived from Pachisi, another traditional Indian pastime, which in early modern times was played on a giant marble court by Mughal emperor Akbar the Great.[489] Cricket is the most popular sport in India.[490] Major domestic competitions include the Indian Premier League, which is the most-watched cricket league in the world and ranks sixth among all sports leagues.[491] Other professional leagues include the Indian Super League (football) and the Pro Kabaddi league.[492][493][494] Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar about to score a record 14,000 runs in Test cricket while playing against Australia in Bangalore, 2010 India has won two ODI Cricket world cups, the 1983 edition and the 2011 edition, as well as becoming the inaugural Twenty20 International Cricket Champions in 2007. India also has eight field hockey gold medals in the summer olympics[495] The improved results garnered by the Indian Davis Cup team and other Indian tennis players in the early 2010s have made tennis increasingly popular in the country.[496] India has a comparatively strong presence in shooting sports, and has won several medals at the Olympics, the World Shooting Championships, and the Commonwealth Games.[497][498] Other sports in which Indians have succeeded internationally include badminton[499] (Saina Nehwal and P. V. Sindhu are two of the top-ranked female badminton players in the world), boxing,[500] and wrestling.[501] Football is popular in West Bengal, Goa, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and the north-eastern states.[502] India has hosted or co-hosted several international sporting events: the 1951 and 1982 Asian Games; the 1987, 1996, and 2011 Cricket World Cup tournaments; the 2003 Afro-Asian Games; the 2006 ICC Champions Trophy; the 2009 World Badminton Championships; the 2010 Hockey World Cup; the 2010 Commonwealth Games; and the 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup. Major international sporting events held annually in India include the Maharashtra Open, the Mumbai Marathon, the Delhi Half Marathon, and the Indian Masters. The first Formula 1 Indian Grand Prix featured in late 2011 but has been discontinued from the F1 season calendar since 2014.[503] India has traditionally been the dominant country at the South Asian Games. An example of this dominance is the basketball competition where the Indian team won four out of five tournaments to date.[504] See also flag India portal icon Asia portal Administrative divisions of India Outline of India
  • Condition: Used
  • Type: Photograph
  • Year of Production: 1946
  • Country/Region of Manufacture: United States
  • Subject: India

PicClick Insights - INDIA PAKISTAN COMMUNISM NEGATIVES PHOTOS Malik Fazal Elahi Qurban Punjab 1946 PicClick Exclusive

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