Gilgit-Baltistan (
Urdu: , ) is
a non-self-governing territory under Pakistani control. The
territory, which does not constitutionally form part of Pakistan
proper, was formerly known as the
Northern Areas (
Urdu: ,
). It is the northernmost political entity within the
Pakistani-controlled part of the former
princely state of Jammu and
Kashmir.
It borders Afghanistan
to the north, China
to the
northeast, the Pakistani-administered state of Azad Jammu and
Kashmir
(AJK) to the south, and the Indian-administered state of Jammu and
Kashmir
to the southeast. The territory became a
single administrative unit in 1970 under the name "Northern Areas"
and was formed by the amalgamation of the
Gilgit Agency, the
Baltistan District of the Ladakh Wazarat, and the
states of
Hunza and
Nagar.
With its
administrative center at the town of Gilgit
,
Gilgit-Baltistan covers an area of 72,971 km²
(28,174 mi²) and has an estimated population approaching
1,000,000. The territory is part of the larger disputed territory of Kashmir
and has been
in dispute between India, Pakistan, and China since
1947.
History
Before the
independence of Pakistan
and the
partition of India in 1947,
Maharaja Hari
Singh extended his rule to Gilgit
and Baltistan. After the partition,
Jammu and
Kashmir, in its entirety, remained an independent state.
The
Pakistani parts of Kashmir to the north and west of the cease-fire
line established at the end of the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947, or
the Line of
Control
as it later came to be called, were divided into
the Northern Areas (72,971 km²) in the north and the Pakistani
state of Azad
Kashmir
(13,297 km²) in the south. The name
"Northern Areas" was first used by the
United Nations to refer to the northern areas
of Kashmir. A small part of the Northern Areas, the
Shaksgam tract, was provisionally
ceded by Pakistan to the People's Republic of China in 1963.
Gilgit-Baltistan, which was most recently known as the Northern
Areas, presently consists of seven districts, has a population
approaching one million, has an area of approximately 28,000 square
miles, and shares borders with Pakistan, China, Afghanistan, and
India. The people of this remote region were liberated from the
Dogra regime of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir on 1
November 1947 without any external assistance and then became
citizens of a self-liberated and very short-lived independent
state. The new state asked the government of Pakistan to provide it
with necessary assistance with which to conduct its affairs, as it
did not have the necessary administrative infrastructure of its
own. The government of Pakistan accepted the request and sent
Sardar Muhammad Alam Khan, an extra assistant commissioner from the
NWFP, to Gilgit. Sardar Muhammad Alam Khan then took control of the
territory's administration as its first appointed political
agent.
The local
Northern Light
Infantry is the army unit that was believed to have assisted
and possibly participated in the 1999
Kargil
conflict. More than 500 soldiers were believed to have been
killed and buried in the Northern Areas in that action.
Lalak Jan, a soldier from
Yasin Valley, was awarded Pakistan's most
prestigious medal, the
Nishan-e-Haider, for his courageous actions
during the Kargil conflict.
Autonomous status and present-day Gilgit-Baltistan
On 29 August 2009, the Gilgit-Baltistan Empowerment and
Self-Governance Order 2009, was passed by the Pakistani cabinet and
later signed by the President. It granted self-rule to the people
of the former Northern Areas, now renamed "Gilgit-Baltistan," by
creating, among other things, an elected legislative
assembly.
In early
September 2009, Pakistan signed an
agreement with China of a mega
energy project in Gilgit-Baltistan which includes the construction
of a 7000-megawatt dam at Bunji in the
Astore
District
of the
Gilgit-Baltistan. This also resulted in protest from India
, however
Indian concerns were immediately rejected by Pakistan, saying the
Government of India has no
locus standi in the
matter.
On September 29, Prime Minister
Yusuf
Raza Gilani while addressing a huge gathering at
Gilgit-Baltistan announced a multi-billion rupee development
package aimed at the socio-economic uplifting people in the area.
Development projects will include the areas of education, health,
agriculture, tourism and basic needs of life. The Prime Minister
further went on to say:
"You are getting your identity today. It is your right
and has been your demand, and today we are fulfilling
it."
Subdivisions
Gilgit-Baltistan is administratively divided
into two divisions which, in turn, are divided into seven
districts, including the two Baltistan
districts of Skardu and Ghanche, and the five Gilgit districts of
Gilgit, Ghizer, Diamer, Astore, and
Hunza-Nagar.
The main
political centres are the towns of Gilgit and Skardu
.
| Division |
District |
Area (km²) |
Population (1998) |
Headquarters |
| Baltistan |
Ghanche |
9,400 |
88,366 |
Khaplu |
| |
Skardu |
18,000 |
214,848 |
Skardu |
| Gilgit |
Astore |
8,657 |
71,666 |
Gorikot |
| |
Diamir |
10,936 |
131,925 |
Chilas |
| Ghizar |
9,635 |
120,218 |
Gahkuch |
| |
Gilgit |
39,300 |
383,324 |
Gilgit |
| |
Hunza-Nagar |
|
|
|
| Gilgit-Baltistan total |
7 districts |
72,971 |
970,347 |
Gilgit |
Geography
Gilgit-Baltistan borders the Wakhan corridor of Afghanistan to the
northwest, China's Uygur Autonomous Region of Xinjiang to the
northeast, the Indian-controlled state of Jammu and Kashmir to the
south and southeast, the Pakistani-controlled state of Azad Jammu
and Kashmir to the south, and Pakistan's North-West Frontier
Province to the west.
Until the
war in North-West
Pakistan, Gilgit-Baltistan was a major destination for foreign
tourists, especially serious mountaineers, because it is home to
five of the "
eight-thousanders" and
to more than fifty peaks above 7000 meters.
Gilgit and Skardu are the two
main hubs for expeditions to those mountains. The region is home to
some of the world's highest
mountain ranges—the main ranges are the Karakoram
and the western Himalayas
. The Pamir
mountains
are to the north, and the Hindu Kush
lies to the west. Amongst the highest
mountains are K2
(Mount
Godwin-Austen) and Nanga
Parbat
, the latter being one of the most feared mountains
in the world.
Three of
the world's longest glaciers outside the polar regions are found in
Gilgit-Baltistan — the Biafo Glacier
, the Baltoro Glacier
, and the Batura Glacier
. There are, in addition, several
high-altitude lakes in Gilgit Baltistan:
The
Deosai
Plains
, called Byarsa in Baltistan, are located above the
tree line, and constitute the second-highest plateau in the world
at 4,115 meters (14,500 feet). The plateau lies
south of Skardu and west of
Ladakh
. The
area was declared to be a
national
park in 1993. The Deosai Plains cover an area of almost 5,000
square kilometres. For over half the year (between September and
May), Deosai is snow-bound and cut off from rest of Baltistan. The
villages of Byarsa/Deosai are connected with the Kargil district of
Ladakh through an all-weather road, but due to the closure of the
border with the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, the people of
Byarsa and Gultari are stranded for the winter months and are,
therefore, not able to take advantage of the economic resources of
Ladakh during that time.
Climate
The climate of Gilgit-Baltistan varies from region to region,
surrounding mountain ranges creates sharp variations in weather.
The
eastern part has a moist zone of western Himalayas but going toward
Karakoram and Hindu
Kush the climate dries considerably.
There are
towns like Gilgit and Chilas that are
very hot during the day in summer, yet cold at night, and valleys
like Astore
, Khaplu, Yasin, Hunza, and Nagar where the temperatures are cold even in
summer.
Sports
Polo is the favourite game of the people of
Gilgit, Chilas, Astore, Hunza, and the surrounding areas. Every
year, many tourists visit to enjoy polo in Gilgit Baltistan. Other
games such as
cricket,
gulli danda,
kabbadi,
and
volleyball are also played.
Rock art and petroglyphs
There are
more than 20,000 pieces of rock art and petroglyphs all along the Karakoram
Highway
in Gilgit Baltistan, concentrated at ten major
sites between Hunza and Shatial. The carvings were left by various
invaders, traders, and
pilgrims who passed
along the trade route, as well as by locals. The earliest date back
to between 5000 and 1000
BCE, showing
single animals, triangular men and hunting scenes in which the
animals are larger than the hunters. These
carvings were pecked into the rock with stone
tools and are covered with a thick
patina
that proves their age.The archaeologist
Karl Jettmar has pieced together the history of
the area from various inscriptions and recorded his findings in
Rock Carvings and Inscriptions in the Northern Areas of
Pakistan and the later released
Between Gandhara and the
Silk Roads - Rock Carvings Along the Karakoram Highway.
Transport
Prior to 1978, Gilgit-Baltistan was cut off from Pakistan due to
the harsh terrain and the lack of accessible roads.
All of the roads to
the south opened towards the Pakistani-controlled state of Azad Jammu and
Kashmir (AKJ) and to the southeast towards the present-day
Indian-controlled state of Jammu and Kashmir. During the
summer, people could walk across the mountain passes to travel to
Rawalpindi. The fastest way to travel, however, was by air, but air
travel was accessible only to a few privileged local people and to
Pakistani military and civilian officials. Then, with the
assistance of the Chinese government, Pakistan began construction
of the Karakoram Highway (KKH), which was completed in
1978.
The
Karakoram
Highway (KKH) connects Islamabad
to Gilgit and Skardu, which are
the two major hubs for mountaineering expeditions in
Gilgit-Baltistan. The journey from Islamabad to Gilgit takes
approximately 20 to 24 hours. Landslides on the
Karakoram
Highway are very common. The KKH
connects
Gilgit to and Kashgar
in China via Sust (the customs
and health inspection post on the Northern Areas side) and the
Khunjerab
Pass
, the highest paved international border crossing in
the world at 4,693 metres (15,397 feet).
Northern Areas
Transport Corporation (NATCO) offers bus and jeep transport
service to the two hubs and several other popular destinations,
lakes, and glaciers in the area.
In March
2006, the respective governments announced that, commencing on June
1, 2006, a thrice-weekly bus service would begin across the
boundary from Gilgit to Kashgar, China, and road
widening work would begin on 600 kilometres of the Karakoram
Highway. There would also be one daily bus in each direction
between the
Sust and border areas of the two
political entities.
Pakistan International
Airlines used to fly a Fokker F27
aircraft daily between Gilgit Airport
and Islamabad International
Airport
. The flying time was approximately 50
minutes, and the flight was one of the most scenic flights in the
world, as its route passes over the mountain Nanga Parbat, the peak of which was higher than the aircraft's
cruising altitude. PIA also offers regular
flights of Boeing 737 between Skardu and Islamabad. However, the Fokker F27 aircraft was
retired after a crash at Multan in 2006. Currently, flights are
being operated by PIA to Gilgit on the brand-new ATR42-500
aircraft, which was purchased in 2006. With the new plane, the
cancellation of flights is much less than it was the Fokker
aircraft. All flights, however, are subject to weather clearance,
and, in winter, flights are often delayed by several days.
Demographics
The population consists of many diverse linguistic, ethnic, and
religious groups, due in part to the many isolated valleys
separated by some of the world's highest mountains.
Urdu is the
lingua franca
of the region, understood by most male inhabitants. The
Shina language (with several dialects) is the
language of 40% of the population, spoken mainly in Gilgit,
throughout Diamer, and in some parts of Ghizer. The
Balti dialect, a sub-dialect of Ladakhi and
part of
Tibetan language group, is
spoken by the entire population of Baltistan. Minor languages
spoken in the region include
Wakhi,
spoken in upper Hunza, and in some villages in Ghizer, while
Khowar is the major language of
Ghizer.
Burushaski is an isolated
language spoken in
Hunza,
Nagar,
Yasin (where Khowar
is also spoken), in some parts of Gilgit and in some villages of
Punyal. Another interesting language is
Domaaki, spoken by the musician
clans in the region. A small minority of people also speak
Pashto. People who live in Gilgit-Baltistan,
despite that region's being referred to as part of Kashmir, do not
speak
Kashmiri or any of its
dialects.
At the last census (1998), the population of Gilgit-Baltistan was
870,347. Approximately 14% of the population was urban.
See also
References
Further reading
- Pakistan Trekking Guide, by Isobel and Ben Shaw,
1993.
External links
in Byarsa
Thang/Deosai Plains - Baltistan
-
Baltistan
- Gilgit
In Kromber Pass -
Gilgit
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