Follow us on | Guide to Pakistan |
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Intrdouction :
Parliament house in IslamabadPakistan is the sixth most populous country in the world and is the second most populous country with a Muslim majority. Its territory was a part of the pre-partitioned British India and has a long history of settlement and civilisation including the Indus Valley Civilisation. Most of its current territory was conquered in the 1st millennium BCE by Persians and Greeks and ruled by them for a few centuries. For the rest of history the region was part of a various local and Central Asian dynasties. Later arrivals and conquests include those by the Arabs, Afghans, Turks, Baloch and Mongols. The territory was incorporated into British India in the nineteenth century. Since its independence, the country has experienced periods of significant military and economic growth and has also experienced times of significant instability.
Quick Statistics about Pakistan: Capital: Islamabad | Largest city: Karachi - Official languages: Urdu (national), English (official) - Demonym Pakistani
Area
Population - 2007 estimate 161,488,000 (6th) - Density 206/km² (53rd) GDP (PPP) 2007 estimate - Total $465.4 billion (25th) - Per capita $2,943 (128th) Currency Rupee (Rs.) (PKR) Time zone PST (UTC+5) - Summer (DST) not observed (UTC+6) Internet TLD .pk Calling code +92
History:
The two wings of Pakistan in 1970; East Pakistan separated from the West wing in 1971 as an independent Bangladesh.Civilian rule resumed from 1972 to 1977 under Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, until he was deposed and later sentenced to death in what amounted to a judicial murder in 1979 by General Zia-ul-Haq, who became the country's third military president. Pakistan's secular policies were replaced by Zia's introduction of the Islamic Shariah legal code, which increased religious influences on the civil service and the military. With the death of General Zia in a plane crash in 1988, Benazir Bhutto, daughter of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, was elected as the first female Prime Minister of Pakistan. Over the next decade, she alternated power with Nawaz Sharif, as the country's political and economic situation worsened. Pakistan sent 5,000 troops to the 1991 Gulf War as part of a US led coalition and specifically for the defence of Saudi Arabia. Military tensions in the Kargil conflict with India were followed by a Pakistani military coup d'état in 1999[23] in which General Pervez Musharraf assumed executive powers. In 2001, Musharraf named himself President after the forced resignation of Rafiq Tarar. After the 2002 parliamentary elections, Musharraf transferred executive powers to newly elected Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali, who was succeeded in the 2004 Prime-Ministerial election by Shaukat Aziz, followed by a temporary period in office by Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain.
Government:
Economy:
The growth of non-agricultural sectors has changed the structure of the economy, and agriculture now only accounts for roughly 20% of the GDP. The service sector accounts for 53% of the country's GDP with wholesale and retail trade forming 30% of this sector. In recent times, the Karachi Stock Exchange has soared, along with most of the world's emerging markets. Large amounts of foreign investments have been made into several industries. The top industries in Pakistan are telecom, software, automotives, textiles, cement, fertilizer, steel, ship building, and more recently, aerospace.
Source: wikipedia.org |
Pakistan officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan (Urdu: اسلامی جمہوریۂ پاکستان), is a republic in South Asia, marking the region where South Asia converges with Central Asia and the Middle East.It has a 1,046 kilometer (650 mile) coastline along the Arabian Sea in the south, and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast.
The name "Pakistan" means "Land of the Pure" in Urdu, and Persian. It was coined in 1934 as "Pakstan" by Choudhary Rahmat Ali, who published it in the pamphlet Now or Never. The name represented, according to Ali, the "thirty million Muslims of PAKSTAN, who live in the five Northern Units of (British) India, Punjab, N.W.F.P. (Afghania), Kashmir, Sindh, and Baluchistan." The nation was founded officially as the Dominion of Pakistan in 1947, and was renamed the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in 1956.
Pakistan was formed on 14 August 1947 with two Muslim-majority wings in the eastern and northwestern regions of the British Indian Empire, separated from the rest of the country with a Hindu majority, and comprising the provinces of Balochistan, East Bengal, the North-West Frontier Province, West Punjab and Sindh. The partition of the British Indian Empire resulted in communal riots across India and Pakistan-millions of Muslims moved to Pakistan and millions of Hindus and Sikhs moved to India. Disputes arose over several princely states including Jammu and Kashmir whose ruler had acceded to India following an invasion by Pashtun warriors, leading to the First Kashmir War (1948) ending with Pakistan occupying roughly one-third of the state. From 1947 to 1956, Pakistan was a Dominion in the Commonwealth of Nations. The republic declared in 1956 was stalled by a coup d'etat by Ayub Khan (1958-69), who was president during a period of internal instability and a second war with India in 1965. His successor, Yahya Khan (1969-71) had to deal with the cyclone which caused 500,000 deaths in East Pakistan. Economic and political dissent in East Pakistan led to violent political repression and tensions escalating into civil war (Bangladesh War of Independence) (see also Causes of Separation of East Pakistan) and the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971 and ultimately the secession of East Pakistan as the independent state of Bangladesh.Estimates of the number of people killed during this episode vary greatly, from ~30,000 to over 2 million depending on the source.
Prime Minister's Secretariat The Muslim League formed Pakistan's first government under the leadership of Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Liaquat Ali Khan. The Muslim League's leadership of Pakistani politics decreased significantly with the rise of other political parties, including the Pakistan People's Party in West Pakistan, and the Awami League in East Pakistan, which would ultimately led to the creation of Bangladesh. The first Constitution of Pakistan was adopted in 1956, but was suspended in 1958 by Ayub Khan. The Constitution of 1973, suspended in 1977 by Zia-ul-Haq, was re-instated in 1991 and is the country's most important document, laying the foundations of government. Pakistan is a federal democratic republic with Islam as the state religion. The semi-presidential system includes a bicameral legislature consisting of a 100-member Senate and a 342-member National Assembly. The President is the Head of State and the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces and is elected by an electoral college. The prime minister is usually the leader of the largest party in the National Assembly. Each province has a similar system of government with a directly elected Provincial Assembly in which the leader of the largest party or alliance becomes Chief Minister. Provincial Governors are appointed by the President.
Pakistan is an active member of the United Nations (UN) and the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), the latter of which Pakistan has used as a forum for Enlightened Moderation, a plan to promote a renaissance and enlightenment in the Muslim world. Pakistan is also a member of the major regional organisations of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) and the Economic Cooperation Organisation (ECO). In the past, Pakistan has had mixed relations with the United States especially in the early 1950s when Pakistan was the United States' "most allied ally in Asia" and a member of both the Central Treaty Organisation (CENTO) and the Southeast Asia Treaty Organisation (SEATO). During the Soviet-Afghan War in the 1980s Pakistan was a crucial US ally, but relations soured in the 1990s, when sanctions were applied by the US over suspicions of Pakistan's nuclear activities. The September 11 attacks and the subsequent War on Terrorism have seen an improvement in US,Pakistan ties, especially after Pakistan ended its support of the Taliban regime in Kabul. This was evidenced by a drastic increase in American military aid, which saw Pakistan take in $4 billion more in three years after the 9/11 attacks than in the three years before.
Pakistan is a rapidly developing country which has faced a number of challenges on both political and economic fronts. Despite being a very poor country in 1947, Pakistan's economic growth rate was better than the global average during the subsequent four decades, but imprudent policies led to a slowdown in the late 1990s. Recently, wide-ranging economic reforms have resulted in a stronger economic outlook and accelerated growth especially in the manufacturing and financial services sectors. There has been great improvement in the foreign exchange position and rapid growth in hard currency reserves in recent years. The 2005 estimate of foreign debt was close to US$40 billion. However, this has decreased in recent years with assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and significant debt-relief from the United States. Pakistan's gross domestic product, as measured by purchasing power parity (PPP), is estimated to be US$475.4 billion while its per capita income (PCI) stands at $2,976.[37] Despite clear progress, reports by the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank and the UN Development Program place the poverty rate in Pakistan between 23% - 28%.[38] The CIA factbook places the poverty rate at 24% in 2006,[39] and notes that levels have fallen by ten percent since 2001. Pakistan's GDP growth rates have seen a steady increase over the last 5 years. However, inflationary pressures and a low savings rate, among other economic factors, could make it difficult to sustain a high growth rate, according to some analysts. 
