Pakistan or officially called the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, it is a country in South Asia. Pakistan has a 1.046 km (650 mile) coastline along the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by India, Afghanistan, Iran, and also China. Pakistan occupied by people from different ethnicity, faith, and cultures as the influence from the cultural exchange of various countries surrounding Pakistan.
We can find Hindus, Indo-greeks, Turco-mongols, Muslims, Afghans, and Sikhs in Pakistan. Such a country with so much cultures and ethnicity. The populations in Pakistan itself are dominated by four main group of ethnic including Balochs, Sindhis, Pashtuns, and Punjabis. The Punjabis itself dominate with 45% percentage of all the ethnic. You may want to know about the history Christmas in Islam.
The capital territory of Pakistan is Islamabad. With the largest population is the city of Karachi and Lahore with more than 10 millions people. While the religion in Pakistan majority are Muslims or Islam with minorities of Hinduism, Christianity, and other small religion like Sikhism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Parsi. But almost 0.5% of people in Pakistan also included as agnostic or atheists which means they do not profess any faith.
The History of Islam in Pakistan
Pakistan is one of the largest country after Indonesia according the number of Muslims. But different from Indonesia, the Muslims there are divided into two majority which are Sunni and Shias. They also have Ahmadis which are represent of 0.22-2% of the population in Pakistan.
The question is how could Islam can be so enormous in Pakistan? Before became a country, Pakistan is part of India and gain their independence since 1900. Muhammad Ali Jinnah is the key person that lead Pakistan to be a great Islamic country. To gain their independence and separated from India, the now Country of Pakistan established The Muslim League. And at 1916 the organization lead by Muhammad Ali Jinnah who develop strong association with the ulama. Jinnah always have a quote or message to his people to always bring Unity, Faith, and Discipline,
“to create a solid bloc of all Muslim states from Karachi to Ankara, from Pakistan to Morocco. He (Jinnah) wanted to see the Muslims of the world united under the banner of Islam as an effective check againts the aggressive design of their enemies.”
After brief fight to gain their independence at the year of 1947 Pakistan became an independece country and became a republic country as well. Read also about importance of wednesday in Islam.
Islamic religion entering Pakistan long before Pakistan established as a single independence country in the lead of Walid Bin Abdul Malik in the year of 705-715. In the past, Pakistan was lead by the Brahman family as one of the castes in Hindu. But under their lead, the people and society are getting under preasure and feel depressed.
Their economy and social life were pressed and controlled by them. Therefore the people seek of help and support from the Damascus. Under the order of caliph of Walid bin Abdul, a troop lead by Muhammad bin Qasim was send to ruled the goverment of Sind. They rule with a great and wise order, all the people from any ethnic was satisfied by the rule of Muhammad bin Qasim.
Their basic right like religion, social, and economic fullfiled by the goverment without any restrictions. They also treat Hindu people equal as other people, they give them a same right to occupy the seat of goverment and minister. You may want to read about meditation in Islam.
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But right after Muhammad bin Qasim back to Damascus, the hindu people became to fight back and create rebellion. After that commotion, the dinasy of Abbasiyyah send their troops to Sind to replace the governor from the dinasy of Umayyah.
At the time of caliph of Al Makmum from the dinasy of Abbasiyyah in the year 813-833 there are lot of family from Arab that moved to Sind that became provinces lead by small princes. And after that periodically Sind ruled by Islamic goverment from one dinasy to another dinasty. Slowly the native people in Sind converted to Islam.
But the formal step taken to transform Pakistan into an Islamic ideological country was in March 1949 when the first Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan introduced Objective Resolution in the Constituent Assembly. Its declared that sovereignty is belongs to the Almighty God.
The declaration then leads the president of Muslim League, Chaudhry Khaliquzzaman, to believed that Pakistan is not yet an Islamic state of country but only a muslim country. Therefore in his opinion it is best to bring all people into a single political unit. Keith Callard state in the following words:
“Pakistan was founded to advance the cause of Muslims. Other Muslims might have been expected to be sympathetic, even enthusiastic. But this assumed that other Muslim states would take the same view of relation between religion and nationality.”
The first general elections conducted in 1973 declared that Pakistan became an Islamic Republic and Islam as the state religion. And all the basic law are following the Quran and Sunnah in Islam. The Constitution also create institutions to support this choice such as Shariat Court and the Council of Islamic Ideology.
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They also bring their idea to the outside world and became one of the originator of International organization of Muslims countries that was fulfilled in 1970s when the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) was declared and established. Read also about law of celebrating non muslim festivals.
Pakistanis are different from other country which majority of its people are muslims. They tend to identify their religion more than their nationality. In such a contrary to other country like Egypt, Indonesia, and also Jordan.
And that is the brief history of Islam in Pakistan. The building architecture in Pakistan were also influenced by Islam. The arrival of Islam has ended the Budhism architectural buildings in Pakistan. Most of the iconic building influenced by Islam are Badshahi Mosque, fortress of Lahore, Alamgiri Gate, Wazir Khan Mosque, Shahjahan Mosque. Minar-e-Pakistan, Mazar-e-Quaid. But they are also influenced by Budhism and British Design.
The spread of Islam in South Asia are became larger and is part of the brief history of Islam in Pakistan, and as a good muslims it is our duty to represent us as the ambassador of Islam. We do not need to pursue our goverment to follow Pakistan.
But as long as our rights can be fulfilled and championed by our state, it is our duty also to became a good citizen. Pakistan and Indonesia have many similarities, we have to learn from them. But still Indonesa is unique with its own characteristic of people. Read also about reasons why doing hajj when young is a must.