Post
Independence
Pakistan was formed on 14 August 1947 with two Muslim-majority
wings in the eastern and northwestern regions of South Asia,
separated by Hindu-majority India, and comprising the provinces
of Balochistan, East Bengal, the North-West Frontier Province,
West Punjab and Sindh. The partition of British India 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 King had acceeded to India
and finally led to the First Kashmir War (1948) ending with
Pakistan and India each occupying large parts of the state.
From 1947 to 1956, Pakistan was a Dominion in the Commonwealth
of Nations. The republic declared in 1958 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 Liberation War) and the Indo-Pakistani
War of 1971 and ultimately the secession of East Pakistan
as the independent state of Bangladesh.
Civilian rule resumed from 1972 to 1977 under Zulfikar Ali
Bhutto, until he was deposed and later sentenced to death
in what accounts to a judicial murder in 1979 by General Zia-ul-Haq,
who became the third military president. Pakistan's secular
policies were replaced by Zia's introduction of the Islamic
Shariat 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.[15] Military tension in the Kargil
conflict[16] with India in 1999 was followed by a military
coup[17] in which General Pervez Musharraf assumed executive
powers. In 2001, Musharraf became President after the 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. |
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