Pakistan

John F. Murphy Jr.

PRIOR TO INDEPENDENCE in August 1947, Pakistan was the western provinces of the British Empire, or Raj, of India. Because of its geographic proximity to Afghanistan and the wild tribes of the Northwest Frontier, it always formed more of a military enclave than the rest of the country. This became the Republic of India when the great Indian Empire was partitioned into the two nations. Indeed, future Pakistani cities like Quetta began life more as garrison towns than as civilian settlements like the cities of Bombay and Calcutta in what would be India. This military factor, as far as the pervasive influence of Islam, would contribute to the more conservative, rightist mien of Pakistan after independence. The man who justly deserves the name given to him, the “Father of the Country,” Quaid-i-Azam, was Mohammed Ali Jinnah. He was born in 1876, 18 years after the British Indian dominion passed from ...

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