Pakistanis (, ) are the citizens and nationals of the Pakistan. Pakistan is the fifth-most populous country, with a population of over 241.5 million, having the second-largest Muslim population as of 2023.
Located in South Asia, the country is also the source of a significantly large diaspora, most of whom reside in the Arab countries of the Persian Gulf, with an estimated population of 4.7 million.
Ethnic subgroups
Ethnically, Indo-Aryan peoples comprise the majority of the population in the eastern provinces of Pakistani Punjab,
Sindh, and
Kashmir, while
Iranian peoples comprise the majority in the western provinces of Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. In addition to its four provinces, Pakistan also administers
Kashmir conflict known as
Azad Kashmir and
Gilgit-Baltistan; both territories also have an Indo-Aryan majority with the exception of the latter's subregion of
Baltistan, which is largely inhabited by
. Pakistan also hosts an insignificant population of Dravidian peoples, the majority of whom are
who trace their roots to historical
such as
Hyderabad State and are identified with the multi-ethnic community of Muhajirs (), who arrived in the country after the partition of British India in 1947.
Major ethnolinguistic groups in the country include Punjabis, Pashtuns, Sindhis, Saraiki people, and Baloch people;
Culture
The existence of Pakistan as an
Islamic state since the 1956 constitution has led to the large-scale injection of
Islam into most aspects of Pakistani culture and everyday life, which has accordingly impacted the historical values and traditions of the Muslim-majority population. Marriages and other major events are significantly impacted by regional differences in culture but generally follow
Fiqh where required. The national dress of Pakistan is the
shalwar kameez, a
Unisex clothing widely-worn,
and
national dress,
of Pakistan. When women wear the shalwar-kameez in some regions, they usually wear a long scarf or shawl called a
dupatta around the head or neck.
The dupatta is also employed as a form of modesty—although it is made of delicate material, it obscures the upper body's contours by passing over the shoulders. For Muslim women, the dupatta is a less stringent alternative to the
chador or
burqa.
Languages
Urdu, or
Lashkari (لشکری ),
[Singh, Shashank, and Shailendra Singh. "Systematic review of spell-checkers for highly inflectional languages". Artificial Intelligence Review 53 (2020): 4051-4092.] an Indo-Aryan language, is the
lingua franca of Pakistan, and while it shares official status with
English language, it is the preferred and dominant language used for inter-communication between different ethnic groups. It is not believed to be a language affiliated with any ethnicity and its speakers come from various backgrounds.
Although Indo-Aryan in classification, its exact origins as a language are disputed by scholars.
[Qureshi, Omar. "Twentieth-century Urdu literature". Handbook of Twentieth Century Literatures of India (1996): 329-362.] However, despite serving as the country's lingua franca, most Pakistanis speak their ethnic languages and the lingua franca as second. Numerous regional and provincial languages are spoken as native languages by Pakistan's various ethnolinguistic groups, with the
Punjabi language having a national plurality as the first language of approximately 45 per cent of the total population. Languages with more than a million speakers each include
Pashto,
Sindhi language,
Saraiki language,
Balochi language,
Brahui language, and
Hindko. The Pakistani dialect of English is also widely spoken throughout the country, albeit mostly in urban centres such as
Islamabad,
Lahore and
Karachi.
Religion
Pakistan officially endorses
Islam as a
state religion. The overwhelming majority of Pakistanis identify as
Muslims, and the country has the second-largest population of Muslims in the world after
Indonesia.
[see: Islam by country] Other minority religious faiths include Hinduism, Christianity, Ahmadiyya, Sikhism, the Baháʼí Faith,
Parsis, and Kalasha. Pakistan's Hindu and Christian minorities comprise the second- and third-largest religious groups in the country, respectively.
Diaspora
[[File:Map of the Pakistani Diaspora in the World.svg|right|thumb|Distribution of Pakistani diaspora
]]
The Pakistani diaspora maintains a significant presence in the Middle East, Europe, North America, and Australia. According to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Pakistan has the in the world.
See also
-
List of Pakistanis
-
Islam in Pakistan
-
Demographics of Pakistan
-
Ethnic groups in Pakistan
-
Overseas Pakistanis
Notes
Further reading
-
Abbasi, Nadia Mushtaq. "The Pakistani diaspora in Europe and its impact on democracy building in Pakistan". International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (2010).
-
Awan, Shehzadi Zamurrad. "Relevance of Education for Women's Empowerment in Punjab, Pakistan". Journal of International Women's Studies 18.1 (2016): 208+ online
-
Bolognani, Marta, and Stephen Lyon, eds. Pakistan and its diaspora: multidisciplinary approaches (Springer, 2011).
-
Eglar, Zekiya. A Punjabi Village in Pakistan: Perspectives on Community, Land, and Economy (Oxford UP, 2010).
-
Kalra, Virinder S., ed. Pakistani Diasporas: Culture, conflict, and change (Oxford UP, 2009).
-
Bano, Sha. "Role of museums in Depicting history of cultural heritage of Pakistan". (2019).
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Marsden, Magnus. " Muslim village intellectuals: the life of the mind in northern Pakistan". Anthropology today 21.1 (2005): 10–15.
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Mughal, M. A. Z. " An anthropological perspective on the mosque in Pakistan". Asian Anthropology 14.2 (2015): 166–181.
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Rauf, Abdur. " Rural women and the family: A study of a Punjabi village in Pakistan". Journal of Comparative Family Studies (1987): 403–415.
Origins of Pakistanis
-
Vasil'ev, I. B., P. F. Kuznetsov, and A. P. Semenova. "Potapovo Burial Ground of the Indo-Iranic Tribes on the Volga" (1994).
-
Ahsan, Aitzaz. The Indus Saga. Roli Books Private Limited, 2005.
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Mehdi, S. Q., et al. "The origins of Pakistani populations". Genomic Diversity. Springer, Boston, MA, 1999. 83–90.
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Balanovsky, Oleg, et al. "Deep phylogenetic analysis of haplogroup G1 provides estimates of SNP and STR mutation rates on the human Y-chromosome and reveals migrations of Iranic speakers". PLoS One 10.4 (2015): e0122968.
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Allchin, F. R. "Archeological and Language-Historical Evidence for the Movement of Indo-Aryan Speaking Peoples into South Asia". NARTAMONGÆ (1981): 65.
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Ahmed, Mukhtar. Ancient Pakistan-an Archaeological History: Volume III: Harappan Civilization-the Material Culture. Amazon, 2014.
