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This page is either always locked, or threatened to be locked.
Exactly which area is there bone of contention?
I haven't edited this page so I am clueless as to what this whole fight is about.
Please elaborate Mercenary2k 00:56, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
The term Ancient Pakistan is valid, I have provided sources countless of times, its not my fault that you wish to ignore the sources. However, the main reason for this page being locked is certain Indian users who cant stop editing the page to fit their POV.
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Unre4L
ITY
02:33, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Certain users keep replacing the term Pakistan with "what is now Pakistan" or "modern Pakistan". There is only one Pakistan and I think its enough to simply say Pakistan. Even though Pakistan is a day older than India, we dont see statements like "What is now India"
I would like to point out that the article always referred to Pakistan as Pakistan, however recently an admin was banned, and the protection was lifted off this page. Before this page was protected, User Dangerous-Boy managed to edit the article and replace the terms. I am requesting comments from people who havent been involved in Edit wars here before.
Unre4L
ITY
02:41, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Whats your point- British India had TWO successor states. India was not the only one. India the country was born in 1947, and whenever you are referring to Republic of India, you should actually be saying "What is now India", because it clearly isnt what used to be India.
I really hoped that you would understand that Pakistan is not being used in a political context, but a term to describe the people if Pakistan, since India refers to the country 99% people will point to on a world map.
If you have a third term to refer to the Pakistani people, and which doesnt already clash with another group of people, Believe me, I will be delighted to hear it.
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Unre4L
ITY
04:13, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Yes. Pakistanis were Indians, but only during the British Raj, and since Indian implies Republic of Indian, its best to stick with British Indian imo. Unre4L ITY 05:36, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
A compromise would be to use the term "What is now Pakistan" once in the introduction, and delete the 40 entries in the main text. Unre4L ITY 18:18, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Blueboar has a point. Nobleeagle [TALK] [C] 22:30, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
No offence Blueboar, but you have obviously not read up on any arguments. When people here refer to India, they refer to the country India, which didnt exist before 1947 either. Then people here prefer to think India before the British Raj was a country, when it was a subcontinent, never united as a country.
And since India is being used, it leaves us no choice but to refer to the land of Pakistan, as Pakistan no matter what era. Note, Pakistan is not being referred to in a political context, but the only term which doesnt clash with another group of people.
Consider this. A country in Asia calls itself Asia. Obviously there has to be a way to differentiate between the 2, not encouraging misleading people to promote the term.
Unre4L
ITY
23:58, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Here I paste my reply regarding the "two successor states" story of Unre4L from Talk:History of India.
“ | The partition of British India in 1947 was interpreted by the United Nations as a case of state secession. Independent India assumed the seat of British India at the United Nations. Despite protests by Pakistan that India and Pakistan were both new states and that the old state had ceased to exist, Pakistan had to apply for new state membership. | ” |
This is turning out to be clearly a case of Argumentum_ad_nauseum. Conveniently ignoring all replies, and sticking to the same absurd argument borders on trolling. deeptrivia ( talk) 03:07, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
We have been through this argument before. Even if India is the successor state and Pakistan was carved out of India, (Which doesnt really makes sense since Pakistan gained independence a day before India), This only joins Pakistan and India, during the British Raj, not an era 5000 years ago, e.g Indus Valley, which has nothing to do with India, except it was a part of British Empire for a while. According to your logic, Iran can claim Indus Valley aswell.
It should be clear who the history belongs to, in this case, not Indians. --
Unre4L
ITY
03:17, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Hmm, again a paste from my comment here will do:
Some excerpts from the first page of Indica (Note: 1 stade = 231 m):
We are not historians, and at wikipedia we only reflect mainstream scholarship, and do not pass judgements on it. I do not propose any changes to wikipedia "according to my logic". This is called original research. So if you want to discuss whether it is right to call the Indus valley a part of historical India, please do that on pakhub. deeptrivia ( talk) 03:29, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
In its scope, this article is analogous to History of the Republic of India. (See also History of the People's Republic of China and History of the Republic of China vs. History of China and History of Taiwan. Article on Taiwan's early history is based on it being an island, not because it is a separate state presently). What I see here is a lot of redundant stuff that should better be covered elsewhere. Are there any reasonable justifications for having IVC, Vedic age, Mauryan empire, etc. on this article? deeptrivia ( talk) 04:26, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Guys. I Thought I made it clear that I wanted opinions of people who hadnt participated Edit warring this article, and gotten it locked in the first place. D-Boy, you are the reason for the "What is now Pakistan" statement coming up 40 times in this article, since it wasnt there before. You vandalised the page before the protection was put on the page, and now you are vandalising this discussion.
We already have a History of South Asia Article, within it contains links to the articles of History of Pakistan within its borders, and history of Republic of India, which seems to contain the history of South Asia. Doesnt make much sense.
I would appreciate it, if you didnt try to vandalise this article, and I am still looking for a comment from someone who wasnt behind this article getting locked.
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Unre4L
ITY
11:57, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Thank you Mercenary2k. I would have nothing against calling Pakistani history, Indian, if there wasnt a country beside us called India. The term clashes and confuses everyone. History of Pakistan is not the political one. Its the history of the people. Unre4L ITY 12:00, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Pakistans People exist, do you agree? What do you want to call Pakistani people before British Raj?, because there certainly wasnt anything called India back then. I dont see how you dont find it misleading to call Pakistani ancestors Indian. India is the country you see on the world map, and this is what people refer to 99% of the times they say India. Pakistani ancestors had nothing to do with that India. Simply because Pakistan was a part of the British empire, doesnt mean it claims the Pakistani peoples history before the British Raj.
Besides, your edit was a case of Vandalism
[4]. You even put Ancient India in, and deleted quite a lot of the text to fit your POV.
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Unre4L
ITY
20:49, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Thats the political history of Pakistan, which can be found here, Pakistan. Like I have said before. This article is the history of the Pakistani people , so it has to cover everything. Why do you wish for us to ignore the history of our people, before 1947 ?. Unre4L ITY 15:43, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
Or something to that sort (someone with more knowledge of Pakistan should be able to do better than that. It just should be clear and not misleading. Nobleeagle [TALK] [C] 03:10, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Just thought I would mention the scheme britannica has adopted on this for comparison. See
this and
this.
deeptrivia (
talk)
00:47, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Just thought I would point out something really obvious. Britannica doesnt link the history of India page to Republic of India. And it makes it very clear its referring to the Indian Subcontinent. Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 12:44, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Oh, that can surely be done.. but this discussion is on the scope of History of Pakistan.
deeptrivia (
talk)
13:11, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I doubt you would support renaming the
History of India article to
History of Indian Subcontinent. I will let you take your words back.
Regarding this discussion. This article has been vandalised by D-Boy, and does need to be edited. History of Pakistan is the history of the Pakistani people and their ancestors. You cant remove any of our history because it doesnt satisfy your POV. --
Unre4L
ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ
UT
15:17, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Just a Question to all Indians here. Why are you guys so obsessed with Pakistani related articles anyways? Do we come to Indian articles and start changing things around? This Article certainly requires a lot of work and major re-structuring but your continual interference has shown that your sole purpose to edit Pakistani related articles is not to make them better but put in mis-information. Mercenary2k 21:09, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Well, I never change anything in the India article, but I do suggest changes. However I certainly dont go around vandalising the India article. Besides, this article might need structure changes, but we dont have anything in this article which doesnt belong here already. Some people are trying hard to get this article deleted altogether. -- Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 21:25, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure there is any reason why there is a need to highlight the Indian posters here as they all vary and its divisive rather than constructive. Some are quite willing to work and compromise and nationality shouldn't be a factor imo. Some nationalist sentiment may exist with some, but working together to find solutions is a better way to go about this and dialectic exchange should work as it then breaks down to what is viable or not. Being Indian doesn't equal nationalist as writers and historians like Romila Thapar are pretty neutral on how they view matters (probably because they study things in detail). The main question here appears to be: Is there a regional history and can it be subsumed into some larger history and if so why or why not? For example, if one thing is taking place in Sri Lanka and another in Pakistan, how are the two part of a single history? From what context? Modern historians write from a starting point of current national boundaries and also consider historic political entities. This article includes the periods that link Pakistan to India and then also consider events that don't. I don't see anything wrong with this approach as it is both realistic and factual. I also don't see the point of adding information that has no real relevance (the Magadha situation) to the region. Tombseye 21:56, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Mercenary2k your question is valid and here is my perspective on it . Please appreciate that there is a very large living population of Indians who have been displaced from their traditional homelands in what is now Pakistan .While Pakistan has achieved an ethnic cleansing of unparalleled magnitude changing the religious and demographic composition to have a 1-2% non Muslims left , were you to look at census figure of 1921 ,1941 ,you may be amazed yourself .
Therefore while it may have been possible to ethnically cleanse the Pakistan areas of Hindus and Sikhs, how are you going to ethnically cleanse the collective social , cultural , historical , consciousness and memory of this displaced population of Hindus and Sikhs .Please understand then that what you consider exclusively Pakistani , is erroneous .Indians are only dealing with their own History .
Similarly refugees from India who now living in Pakistan have roots in India , this same rationale applies to them as well .
The road taken by many Pakistani posters on wikipedia is indicative , completely skip Hindu ,Sikh reference , or undermine it ,sometimes to ridiculous levels . Skip grom Indus valley to Islamic period ??!
On a different note Pakistani support for Palestinians right to their homeland seems contradictory and is a related issue here then considering the question you have raised . Pakistan is a country established with ethnic cleansing of its indigenous population, that denies a homeland to its own Pakistani Muslims stranded in Bangladesh for last 40 years .If Pakistani support to Palestinian homeland is based on principals, then let it first recognize the homeland rights of Hindus and Sikhs from Pakistan, or the Bihari Muslims stranded in Bangladesh first . Please let me have your views on this because it relates to whom the historical heritage of what you refer to as Pakistani belongs.
Articles must not be vandalized, but lets have some balance here my friend.Regards Intothefire 05:50, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
Nobody is skipping Hindu and Sikh references, but out of the 3.5 Million [5] [6] [7] [8] people who left Pakistan, why do 160 million have to be denied their history? -- Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 09:05, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
So do you agree that a distinctly Indian culture did exist from Punjab-Sindh to Bengal-Assam to Tamil Nadu-Kerala? Nobleeagle [TALK] [C] 06:30, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
Tombseye is more or less correct on this matter. He has in fact visited Pakistan and as a non-South Asian can provide a neutral voice on the matter. Pakistan, specifically eastern Pakistan, is apart of Indian civilization.
Balochistan though a key part of Pakistan by land mass, is historically just a transit region between South Asia, West Asia and Central Asia, overall its people are tied to Middle Easterners rather then
Indians/
South Asians. The NWFP is often tied to India in ancient times but with the arrivals of Pashtuns in the first millenium of the Common Era onwards, develops equal ties with Central Asia and the Middle East. But yes, Pakistan is the northwestern segment of a common ethno-linguistic/cultural continuoum from the Khyber pass to
Bengal, from
Kashmir to
Sri Lanka.
Afghan Historian
00:35, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
No need to merge an articles. Pakistan constitutes the bulk of the region historically known as northwestern India and has a unique history of its own, much like how South India has its own history or Northeast India has its own history. Just keep a History of Pakistan article, but make sure to include the words or something to the effect of "the area now known as Pakistan" or "northwestern South Asia", etc. And Tombseye is right, the term "India", "Hindustan", "Indikos", et all, originally referred to the part of the subcontinent now known as Pakistan. With regards to Peshawar and the Middle East, I confess I dont know exactly how one would define what constitutes a "Middle Eastern city". Afghan Historian 21:59, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
True, true. Mainstream Pakistani culture is generally what comes from the eastern more strictly South Asian areas. But it would be wrong to deny the influence of the western Pakistanis on the trends of this region. The Pashtuns have played a key part in the construction of this country, whether it be the Pakistan movement, the army, politics, literature, food, etc. One of Pakistan's greatest 20th century poets, Ghani Khan is a Pashtun. The chapli kebab from the NWFP has become a common fast food snack in Pakistan, much more so then the South Asian samosa and in the same manner as the hamburger in America. It was the Pashtuns who were among the first peoples to consolidate Islam in this area, as well as in greater northern India in general. Part of the reason why many Indians want to put Pashtun areas within a "greater India" is because of these historical contributions to Indian Islam made by the Afghans. That is why I've decided to view the Afghans as a non-South Asian group of people with undeniable constant historical links to the Islamic culture of the subcontinent. Besides, some of the Iranian ancestors of the Pasthuns, the Scythians, are also the ancestors of many Punjabi and Rajput clans as well. Baloch food is also becoming widely popular in Pakistan and many Baloch have reached prominent positions in the Pakistani establishment, despite current problems with the province and certain over emphasis on Punjabis. It would be wrong to buy into commonalities and declare South Asian Urdu Islamic culture as the norm of Pakistan, and deny the impact of these periphary Iranic groups. These areas, however, were incorporated into mainstream India by the British, during the 19th century, as peripheral border regions to protect their Indian empire from foreign attack. They may have had little ties with mainstream India, but they served the British geo-political purpose well. The northeastern areas of modern India, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Tripura, Burma etc. were also incorporated in this fashion, as northeastern buffers against China and Southeast Asia. Had Balochistan been a bit stronger, it could have easily seceded from India and developed as its own country, much like Burma. Afghan Historian 23:40, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
Sure, Pakistan is fast developing a more integrated culture that mixes all people together. Any description of modern Pakistan would be incomplete without mentioning the Pashtun and Baloch influence. There's also no denying of strong historical Afghan influences on what is now Pakistan. These historical influences, however, did not end on the Radcliffe line. Rohilkhand would probably have more Pashtun influence than Cholistan. It is hard to find things about the regions that constitute Pakistan on the east of the "cultural divide" that are not applicable to most of the rest of Indo-Gangetic plains. It should be easier to find things about Baluchistan and NWFP that do not apply on the rest of Pakistan. How important should the modern political borders be in the context of the long history that this region has? Same applies to Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, etc. deeptrivia ( talk) 01:11, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
What Tombseye says is correct with regards to Pakistan, but we must remember, India, as a whole, doesnt have one common history, according to his definition of overlapping history between India and Pakistan. Different events happened in different parts of India. Northwestern India (ie; Rajputana, Punjab and Kashmir) have a historical trend more or less identical to what is in the history of Pakistan. South India has a history that is somewhat different from other parts of India. Northeast India has a history that is almost 100% different from mainstream North India. Like, what happened in what is now Northwestern India is identical or very similar to what happened in Pakistan, even with the unique "Indus-oriented" events taken into consideration. What happened in South India is very different from what happened in North India. For example, the Chola Empire has nothing to do with North India. The Ahom invasion is unrelated to the affairs of the South Indians or the North Indians. While the history is generally the same, the various little differences are not just between India and Pakistan, but between all the different regions of the subcontinent. Pakistan constitutes the bulk of what would have been considered the region of northwestern India pre-Partition, so of course it has a local distinct history. Same with other regions. But its not like, all of India had a 100% common set of events going on that differed from Pakistan. India is a collection of related South Asian regions. Pakistan constitutes a distinct region of South Asia, the northwest, where the subcontinent and both Central Asia and the Middle East meet. Therefore of course you'll have a distinctive history there with a meeting place of ethnicities and languages. Some of what happened in Pakistan may not have occurred in the rest of the subcontinent, yes, so it may not make a lot of sense to include it in a history of India. But, there were parts of India, such as Punjab and Rajputana, where those events did have such an effect, as opposed to other Indian areas. Its for those regions that we should include it. And, Pakistan was in many ways the focal point and base for events in the subcontinent. Much if not most of what happened in this region would undoubtedly affect what happened in the rest of the subcontinent. The drying up of the Indus resulted in the shift of early South Asian civilization to the Gangetic valley. The Aryan migrations into this area soon culminated into an Aryan migration and Aryanization of almost the entire subcontinent. Persian Achaemenid invasions may have only politically affected the Punjab and Sindh, but they allowed for things from those areas to reach the rest of the subcontinent. Persian ideas with regards to political science, architecture, art and certain religious practices soon spread to other parts of the subcontinent, giving certain Indian groups the structure they needed for building a vast and stable pan-subcontinent empire such as the Maurya empire and influenced later Indian poltical science such as the ideas in the Arthashastra. You had art such as the Mauryan Lion columns and the columns at Pataliputra, which certainly had origins in the architecture of Persepolis. Greek invasions allowed for the diffusion of Greek traits in architecture and drama to diffuse. Scythian invasions in this area precipitated Scythian spillover throughout the entire region. Same with the Parthian invasions. Now what may have happened in certain parts of northern and central India did not have an effect in the northwest. The Gupta Empire didnt really touch the northwest such as Punjab or Sindh. The Sassanians, ehh, were probably the one northwestern event that didnt really effect the whole subcontinent or most of it with their control in the area, but there was a distinct blending of Indian and Persian culture here. But, the Muslim invasions did. Arab and Ghaznavid invasions set the stage for the gradual Islamicization of India. The Mongol dip probably didnt make an effect either, but then again that was more in the northern reaches of the Northwest frontier province, that didnt have much tie to India proper anyway. Yet Timur's invasions did, as did the Mughal and Persian invasions of Nadir Shah. The Durrani invasion didnt seem to have much effect in the rest of the country, but it did set the stage for the anarchy in the north that allowed for the competition between Ranjit Singh and the British. Afghan Historian 20:38, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
As for the regions that dont have direct or even existent connection to the Indian civilization, such as the North West Frontier Province (which in Pre-Pashtun days, actually did via Taxila and the ancient Mahajanapadas) and more importantly, Balochistan (which is tied to Persia), these are probably the main regions that keep up the need for a separate History of Pakistan article. Balochistan does have events that do not tie in with India. It has a separate kind of culture and civilization too. Balochistan has always been known to be a border country between India and Persia. But the thing is, where is this history even mentioned in the History of Pakistan article? The reason some people want to merge the history articles together is that the pre-1947 history in the Pakistan article is almost the same as the history in the pre-1947 India article. Almost every event overlaps. Even the Durrani event is shown, as is the Hun invasions. At most the only discrepancies are the Mongol dip in the 1200's and the greater details involving the Arab invasion of Sindh, even though the India article also talks at shorter length about this event as a whole. Someone needs to be more indepth about the distinctly non-Indian aspects of Pakistan's history when writing this article. We cant just expect to keep to articles separate that almost talk about the same thing, word for word, top to bottom. I guess all this hullaballoo comes from the writing of these two articles. Afghan Historian 20:38, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
No, not exactly deep trivia. I think a separate History of Pakistan article talking about pre-1947 history is needed. I just think we have to trim and stuff from and to both India and pakistan articles to make sure they dont overlap almost 100% of the time. Afghan Historian 16:29, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
The History of India proper article talking about pre-1947 history almost matches the History of Pakistan article in pre-1947 content, word for word. Regardless the region of Pakistan is in many ways its own region of the subcontinent, much as South India or the Northeast is, while still tied to civilization of greater India. I think we can have a History of Pakistan article where we can talk about the history in both the Indic and Iranic regions and see how they work together to form what was once Northwest India and greater Iran but now constitutes a separate state. We should trim all miscellaneous northwest related Indian material from the History of India page and instead put back all post-1947 material fromt the History of the Republic of India article. The Indian history books talking about the northwestern Indian historical events such as the Sassanid invasion, the Indo-Parthian era, the era of the Indo-Greeks, the Durranis, the Pashtuns, the Baloch, etc, were all written in the era preceding 1947, when what is now Pakistan was still apart of India. Its 2007 now, 60 years later. We have to treat these histories and label them according to there effects and legacy of today. Here's what the History of Pakistan article should kind of look like from the Table of Contents, with regards to pre-1947 material; this isnt exact, its kind of sloppy, but it should be close enough: I. Mehgarh/Prehistoric II. Indus Valley Civilization III. Aryan migration and Vedic Civilization IV. Mahajanapadas (very very brief however as these areas were exposed to foreign domination early on, but talk about Gandhara, etc.) V. Achaemenid invasions VI. Alexander's Invasion and Selucid Period
a. Porus and Omphius b. Gedrosia and Arachosia (now part of Pakistani Balochistan) c. Pactyans (Pashtuns?)
VII. Mauryan Empire
a. Ashoka and Buddhism b. Taxila
VIII. Indo-Greeks and Bactrians, etc.
a. Greco Buddhism b. Gandhara School of Art c. More on Taxila?
XV. Indo-Scythians X. Indo-Parthians XI. Kushan Empire
a. Kanishka and Buddhist revival
XII. Gupta Empire (kind of brief) XIII. Indo-Sassanians Afghan Historian 22:54, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
I am bloody sick and tired of this garbage is there anyway we can get these brats banned please? All the time I see things changed, without even posting anything in the talk section...talk about insecure.
User:BK2006 - 02:03, January 27, 2007
Actually, one might plausibly make an identical argument about India before its independence, asserting that there never was an "India" per se, but rather an immense patchwork of ethnic groups, principalities, and empires before independence. I'm not sure you want to go there. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.119.255.31 ( talk • contribs) - 21:31, May 23, 2007
The article makes zero mention of the period 1947-1955. There were significant incidents during this period, like the 1954 election, the unstable democracy that saw a surprisingly high number of cabinets being organized and ousted. It also saw the big cultural movement : Language movment, that was the first rift between the West Pakistan and the East Pakistan. Considering the significance of the time period, it is surprising that the article mentions nothing about the time period. -- Ragib 10:05, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
In general, the coverage between 1947 and 1971 leaves a lot to be desired. And the 70s and 80s need a lot of expansion too. I agree with Tombseye -- this is the kind of things this article is supposed to be about. I quote myself from above: "The entire history of Pakistan movement is summarized in a tiny paragraph, and there are similar tiny paragraphs on Pakistan resolution, partition, and such events that led to the creation of Pakistan. " Pakistan" serves as the "main article" for the history of Pakistan after it was created (sec 11)! The article covers next to nothing of the history between 1947 and 1971 -- an eventful time when Pakistan fought two wars. The Indo-Pakistani War of 1947 is not mentioned at all, and one line is written about Indo-Pakistani War of 1965. There is little information about Pakistan in the 1980s. There is little economic history, society, advances in technology, agriculture, etc, little about the problems like the one in Balochistan, etc." These things will take an entire article to cover satisfactorily, and such an article is badly needed. (This would be comparable to History of the Republic of India or History of the People's Republic of China.) deeptrivia ( talk) 16:55, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Half the article should be about pre-Partition history and the other half should describe purely Pakistani history such as the Pakistan movement, the early years, the middle years plus the coup, the first two wars, the constitutional struggle, the ethno-linguistic clashes, the East Bengal independence movement, the simultaneous tensions in Balochistan, the 80's, etc. While much of the Indian history in Pakistan is local based, as much if not a little more is tied with the mainstream history of the subcontinent. All common eras to the subcontinent such as the Indus civilization, Vedic India/Aryans, Alexander, maybe Achaemenids, Mauryans, Kushans, Guptas, and Muslim invasions, (minus Arab conquest of Sindh) should be rather brief and northwestern India-specific events should get more coverage. At the end of pre-1947/Muslim League history, there should be a note stating something to the effect of "for more information on pre-independence Pakistani history, see "History of India", "History of Afghanistan" etc. Especially since most of the detailed pre-1947 history is tied to Indian and Afghani eras. History of Balochistan should also be added to external links. Afghan Historian 21:48, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
I've added a paragraph on early proto-dentistry in Mehrgarh. I've also added the link to the announcement—a one-page pdf—in the journal Nature (April 2006). The Nature article is fascinating and well worth reading. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 09:04, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
Because of the blitz of edit warring, I have protected the page. Thanks. -- Ragib 19:02, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Thank you. Some people want to bombard the article by using terms like "Modern Pakistan" and "What is now Pakistan", at least 30 times in the article. Pakistan has been known by dozens of names; and "India" for less than 100 years. I dont see the point of doing this, however the "modern Pakistan" explanation has been given at the top of the article, and these nationalists are still not happy. -- Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 20:00, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Its not confusing. Just like "Ancient India", when there was no land on the face of this plant called "India" until 1850. Ancient Pakistan is a valid term, and to make Indians happy, an explanation has already been given. Only certain people seem to be making the compromises here, and you are not one of them. I dont remember ever editing anything on the Indian history article, I always discussed the matter. Please make this a habit also.
Your edits would be classed as vandalism since you are not doing anything constructive, but editing (in groups mind you) to promote your own agenda.
--
Unre4L
ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ
UT
22:39, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Why do you keep posting this revised map all the time? Does it never occur to you how all the spellings are exact same as modern maps?. I.e Its a translated map.
Here is an Original British Map from 1808. Note, how the term India was used for the Ocean only, and there is NO land called India.
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/asia_1808.jpg
Here is an Arabic map. Once again note, No India.
http://www.conncoll.edu/academics/departments/relstudies/290/theory/worldmaps/118.gif
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Unre4L
ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ
UT
23:00, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
No one is trying to 'mislead or confuse people'. The first sentence mentions that Pakistan was founded in 1947. Why is their a need to mention modern day or present day every single time? Should we change the aticle of Lahore, and mention that it is located in modern day Pakistan? More on this later. IP198 16:36, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
The lead is too detailed, but also omits the quite important post 1947 event summaries. -- Ragib 12:48, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
After discussions with user:Deeptrivia, I added a clarification in first sentence of the article: "The history of Pakistan—which for the period preceding the nation's founding in 1947 is (presented here as) the history of the region that is now Pakistan and therefore overlaps with the histories of Afghanistan, India, and Iran—traces back to the beginnings of human life in South Asia." [1] However, that was reverted by user:Bakasuprman with an edit summary, "(Pakistan cant have a history so long if the word was not coined up until 1933. nadirali-esque edits are not appreciated)." Since I had discussed some of these issues with user:Deeptrivia, I will (if he doesn't mind) post part of that earlier discussion here.
First, is there precedence for such a history? Yes, there is. Of the four large encyclopedias, three—Encarta, Columbia Encyclopedia, and World Book Encyclopedia—do have a histories of Pakistan, more or less along the lines of the Wikipedia article (although less detailed). The Encarta article, written by Saeed Shafqat, full professor at Columbia University, begins with:
“ | The area of present-day Pakistan has a long history of human settlement as the cradle of the Indus Valley civilization, the earliest-known civilization in South Asia. This Bronze Age culture flourished in the area of the Indus River Valley from about 2500 to 1700 bc. The Indus River is considered the lifeblood of Pakistan, and the ancient culture that arose there serves as an icon of Pakistan’s territorial identity. Important archaeological sites in Pakistan include Mohenjo-Daro (Sindhi for “Mound of the Dead”), in Sind Province, and Harappā, near the Ravi River (a tributary of the Indus) in Punjab Province.
Pakistan’s cultural identity is traced to the centuries of Muslim rule in the region. In AD 711 Mohammad bin Qasim, an Arab general and nephew of Hajjaj, ruler of Iraq and Persia, conquered Sind and incorporated it into the Umayyad Caliphate. Thereafter Muslims continued to rule areas of present-day Pakistan for almost 1,000 years. For the first 300 years the region of Sind was the only part of the Indian subcontinent that was under Muslim rule.... |
” |
The World Book Encyclopedia article on Pakistan, written by Ayesha Jalal, Professor at Tufts and author of The Sole Spokesman, begins with,
“ | Pakistan has a long and complex history, dating back at least 8,000 years to the Mehrgarh civilization in present-day Baluchistan. Later, around 2500 B.C., one of the world's first great civilizations developed in the Indus Valley in what are now Pakistan and northwestern India. Ruins of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro (also spelled Moenjodaro), the two major cities of the civilization, lie in present-day Pakistan. The ruins show that both cities were large and well-planned. By about 1700 B.C., the Indus Valley civilization had gradually declined. | ” |
Similarly, the Columbia Encyclopedia (6th edition, 2001-2005) has a History of Pakistan which begins with:
“ | The northwest of the Indian subcontinent, which now constitutes Pakistan, lies athwart the historic invasion routes through the Khyber, Gumal, and Bolan passes from central Asia to the heartland of India, and for thousands of years invaders and adventurers swept down upon the settlements there. The Indus valley civilization, which flourished until c.1500 B.C., was one of the region’s earliest civilizations. The Aryans, who surpassed the Indus, were followed by the Persians of the Achaemenid empire, who by c.500 B.C. reached the Indus River. Alexander the Great, conqueror of the Persian empire, invaded the Punjab in 326 B.C. | ” |
These articles are written by people in mainstream scholarship, tenured professors at major American universities. The point is that it doesn't matter that Pakistan or Bangladesh were not even a gleam in anyone's eyes before the 20th century, the histories of the regions now occupied by these countries can nonetheless be written, and will necessarily be different—not by POV, but by their focus—from a larger history of (historical) India or South Asia. That has already begun to happen with new sub-topics like Mehrgarh, which were excavated in the 1970s and 80s, long after the partition, and whose current archaeological expertise is either in Pakistan or in France, but not in India. The emerging historiography is already focusing (and will likely focus even more) on links to other contemporaneous Neolithic cultures in Iran and Central Asia rather than later cultures in the region of current-day India.
The History of Pakistan can be written by focusing on all the histories that intersect in the region that is now Pakistan. That means that sometimes that history will be a part of the History of Punjab. Other times, that history might be part of a history of Iran or Aghanistan. For example, Mehrgarh was a part of the History of Neolithic Iran in its early phase, but became a part of the History of the Indus Civilization (as a precursor) in its later phase. The problem arises when someone tries to impute a historical or cultural imperative to the region that is now Pakistan and looks for seeds of Pakistan in events of long ago. That is not what we are doing on this page. We are simply presenting the history of the region. Lastly, as pointed out perceptively to me by user:Deeptrivia, we are not making any false connections, or providing an artificial unity to the history, just because the region later became a country.
I am therefore undoing Bakasuprman's reversion. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 03:30, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Fowler&Fowler did you get a chance to consider rephrasing the lead yet? Arguments such as " The point is that it doesn't matter that Pakistan or Bangladesh were not even a gleam in anyone's eyes before the 20th century," could easily be debated (e.g., I presented several sources like UC Berkeley, Britannica, who start Pakistan's history from the 1930s, and explicitly point people to Indian history for events before that), but for the moment, I would suggest let's try to fix up problems that could be easily be fixed. Let's at least have a disclaimer telling people properly what the article is dealing with at the moment. One problem, as I mentioned yesterday, is that for A and B to "overlap", we should have some notion of separate existence of A and B first. deeptrivia ( talk) 04:53, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Fowler, you are putting too much detail in the lead. Mentioning that Pakistan was founded in 1947 is enough, no need to put in "as the history of the region that is now Pakistan" as well in the same sentence. IP198 17:54, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Aparently, we have had this tag at the top of the page since December. And there is only one missing citation in the whole of article. So, can't we just remove the disputed text and the annoying template altogether? -- Isles Cape Talk 20:27, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi Deeptrivia, What are those things that are back? Let's set them right. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
PS. Also, how did the article get a "B" rating? Is there a discussion for that? Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
In the Golden Age section of the article there is a paragraph:
“ | During those centuries ethnic composition of the region remained in flex until the 7th century, when it was stabilized. Rajputs, Jats, and Gujjars became integral part of the population. With the mixing of the Iranian people, a physical feature became predominated in the Baloch region which resemble to Iranic or other Caucasoid races to the west. This made people of the Baloch region distinct from the rest of the South Asia. These Caucasoid physical features beccome more prominent with the movement of Pakhtuns and Balochis. cited paper | ” |
The cited paper compares the allele frequencies of four genes (which although popular in recent anthropological studies are but four out of the 25,000+ genes in the human genome): HLA-A, -B, -DQB1, and -DRB1 and showed that for those genes the Baloch of Iran are very similar to Baloch and Brahui of Pakistan, and concluded, "This may reflect an admixture of Brahui and Baloch ethnic groups of Pakistan in the Balochistan province of Iran." It says nothing about Caucasoid which is not a molecular-biological term, but rather a much older physical-anthropological notion. The paragraph above claims that "this makes the Baloch region distinct from the rest of South Asia." The paper in fact makes exactly the opposite point, that the Baloch of Iran have an admixture of South Asia. I am therefore removing that entire paragraph which is full of bogus surmising. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:42, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
PS. I have also removed the next paragraph, which is full of similar surmising:
“ | It is surmised that Iranian tribes existed in western Pakistan during a very early age and that Pakhtun tribes were inhabitants around the area of Peshawar prior to the period of Alexander the Great as Herodotus refers to the local peoples as the "Paktui" and as a fearsome pagan tribe similar to the Bactrians. Iranian Balochi tribes did not arrive at least until the first millennium CE and would not expand as far as Sindh until the 2nd millennium. | ” |
Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:47, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
PPS. Finally, Encyclopaedia Britannica's section on "Neolithic Agriculture in the Indus Valley and Baluchistan," says:
“ | Indo-Iranian borderlands form the eastern extension of the Iranian Plateau and in some ways mirror the environment of the Fertile Crescent (the arc of agricultural lands extending from the Tigris-Euphrates system to the Nile valley) in the Middle East. Across the plateau, lines of communication existed from early antiquity, which would suggest a broad parallelism of developments at both the eastern and western extremities. During the late 20th century, knowledge of early settlements on the borders of the Indus system and Baluchistan was revolutionized by excavations at Mehrgarh and elsewhere. The group of sites at Mehrgarh provides evidence of some five or six thousand years of occupation comprising two major periods, the first from the 8th through the 6th millennium BC and the second from the 5th through the 4th (and possibly the 3rd) millennium. | ” |
Fowler&fowler «Talk» 00:16, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Well, I was responding to many things (and being in a hurry didn't clarify). I was replying among others to your statement in a section above, "At any rate, Balochistan has been more of a buffer zone between India and Persia rather than a part of either. On the other hand, Punjab and Sind (currently over 80% of the population, and historically a much higher share of population of the region) have been parts of India proper, in fact, perhaps the only "India" known to most Persians and Greeks." Sorry if I misinterpreted you, but I'm not sure what point you were trying to make there, if not that Baluchistan shouldn't be a part of the History of the-region-that-is-now-Pakistan, because the History of the-region-that-is-now-Pakistan should really be the history of the historically populated part of Pakistan, which in any case is subsumed in the History of (historical) India. The point I was trying to make is that since Mehrgarh is in Baluchistan, that since Baluchistan was not always sparsely populated and therefore historically unimportant (given the history of Mehrgarh and its later morphing into IVC), that since Baluchistan was not considered a part of (historical) India until the British acquired it, (or at the very earliest until the Mughals sporadically subdued it), that since no old world map includes it in Indikos, Indicus, Indiana, etc., but rather as Gedrosia, it makes an even stronger case that the History of the-region-that-is-now-Pakistan be not just the History of (historical) India, but rather a mix of Histories of (historical) Iran, (historical) Afghanistan and (historical) India.
Yes, I know about the Indian subcontinent all too well (having copy edited it recently and having removed claims that Baluchistan was not a part of the subcontinent because it was not on the Indian plate). And I apologize if there was a spill-over of my frustration from copy editing that article. You are right that what I wrote above doesn't apply to the the second paragraph that I removed. I will put the second paragraph in. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:34, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
The lead of this article is could be made more accurate without making it too detailed. We had agreed to some changes, which have not yet been implemented. I am proposing some changes here again. Please point out any problems or inaccuracies in this lead:
The only major change here is that, as Fowler&Fowler and I had agreed, the assertion that Pakistan had a pre-1947 history that "overlapped" with Indian, Iranian and Afghan histories, is removed. Again, as we can see in the lead itself, writing a general pre-1947 history for Pakistan is inherently problematic and is best not done. Baluchistan and Punjab have served entirely different roles in history, and now "the region" as a whole is generalized as a gateway to the Middle East. For now, let's see if this lead is fine. deeptrivia ( talk) 16:07, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
I have reworded the lead and added the information about the partition of British India in a footnote (which is where I think it belongs and not in the lead proper). The new lead sentences now read:
“ | The history of Pakistan—which for the period preceding the country's creation in 1947 [3] is shared with those of Afghanistan, India, and Iran—traces back to the beginnings of human life in South Asia. [4] The ancient lands of present-day Pakistan belonged to both the heartland and frontier of the ancient South Asian world. [5] Spanning the western expanse of the Indian subcontinent and the eastern borderlands of the Iranian plateau, the region served both as the fertile ground of some of South Asia's major civilizations and the gateway to the Middle East and Central Asia. | ” |
I think this gives a balanced view of the history and doesn't over-stress the connection to the Middle-East etc. Also, I have replaced the word "overlaps" with "shared." The links Afghanistan, India, and Iran now link to the current-day countries, and so the statement that the history is shared with those countries is accurate. I have also added 6 maps of the region from 1765 to 1909 (five from the Imperial Gazetteer of India) in the Colonial Era section, which show that what is current-day Pakistan was not covered in the traditional definition of India, or for that matter Afghanistan or Iran. Therefore, the words, "... was shared with those of ..." is more accurate than the previous version "... is a part of the histories of Afghanistan, India, and Iran," since regions like Baluchistan, were not exclusively a part of the histories of Afghanistan or Iran. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 00:01, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
I think the new lead is good, though i did not see a problem with a previous one. The one word that i believe should be taken out is "heartland". The heartland of South Asia is the Delhi, UP region not Pakistan. IP198 02:41, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
I am not using the term politically correct in the usual pejorative sense, but in the sense of inclusive language. Political correctness has a good side too, since it is based on sensitivity to the various implications of a term. Words like "African-American" (for "black," and "black" itself for "Negro"), "Disabled" (for "crippled"), "Mute" (for "dumb"), "Mentally handicapped," (for "retarded"), "Down's syndrome," (for "mongoloid"), were all considered politically correct once, and they are all standard usage now. We are very much concerned with usage on Wikipedia: try changing disabled to crippled. The OED is very much a test of usage, not political correctness in the pejorative sense. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 00:19, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
Obviously I am not, otherwise, I would not have used "Indian subcontinent" in the lead. "South Asia" as I have mentioned before, is used more often in the context of history. If you do a similar Google search on "South Asia" you get 848,000 hits. Anyway, I don't think any more changes need to be made in the lead. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:18, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
I'd like to get various editors' opinion (especially the ones who have worked on this page like Tombseye and IP198) of the following idea. Since this article includes both the history of the Pakistan region until 1947 and that of the republic(s) of Pakistan thereafter, and since it is beginning to burgeon, I thought it might be a good idea to split the page into two pages: History of the Pakistan region (which would have the history of the region until 1947) and History of the (Islamic) Republic of Pakistan, which would have the history from 1947 onwards, but with (and this is important), the History of Pakistan page redirecting to History of the Pakistan region. In addition, the History of the Pakistan region page would have a dab note at the top saying, "For the history of the region after 1947, please refer to History of the (Islamic) Republic of Pakistan".
I'd also like to know what you feel about having a History of South Asia page, which would include more histories and be written along the lines of Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. South Asia: A Timeline In Art History 8000BC-Present. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 18:19, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
Is it really necessary to have two articles? If their are two articles i believe some people will want to remove the pre 47 Pakistan article, and just keep the post 47 one. Also if size is the problem we can summarize some of the sections. if that is not enough what we could do is create a seperate article for the preIslamic history of Pakistan. You cant have an article for the Islamic Republic of Pakistan without mentioning the reason why it was createad. To do that you would have to start with Muhammad bin Qasims liberation of Sindh, all the way to partition. As well as adding post 47 material.
btw fowler, i was looking at the pg history, and i think u have done a great job on this article. IP198 22:20, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
P.S - I dont mind their being a South Asia history pg. IP198 22:21, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
Deep, while that was funny, i dont know why you didnt take the idea seriously. I think the article is fine as it is but you want to change it to start from 47. Thats fine, buy you have to mention the reason why Pakistan was createad. It boils down to this the founders did not create Pakistan because of the Indus Valley Civilization, Gandhara, etc. They createad Pakistan because Muslims ruled the subcontinent for centuries, and they did not want to be part of a "Hindu Raj". No history of Pakistan will be complete without mentioning Muslim rule, which begins from Muhammad bin Qasim.
btw how is Muhammad bin Qasim viewed in India? IP198 17:33, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
Great work so far Fowler! You've clearly put in a lot of work and I'll help when I can and time allows. The Pashtuns article took a lot of out me in terms of free time and I was going to work on the Persians and help with History of Azerbaijan and this article as well I guess! I'd recommend not making two articles as that will confuse laypersons and I think anyone with any semblance of comprehension will understand that the modern nation called Pakistan has inherited a history that is both its own and is often shared with various neighbors, which is probably universally true. Great lead by the way. Very complete. So far the article is really shaping up and I guess at some point will constitute a good article at this rate! I'll check in from time to time and help out and if there's anything specific you need help with let me know. Probably more citations would be cool as well. I added the bibliography at the end as I consulted many of those books when I wrote some of the previous versions of this article. If possible, citing from them and other sources could help matters further. I like your neutral academic rendition and wording. Good job! Tombseye 17:30, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Although I won't like doing this, I might have to put a neutrality tag on this article. "shared with" is almost synonymous with "overlaps with" which we had decided to remove. Why can't we adopt NPOV here? I think a convincing explanation on "shared with" more accurate than "shared between" will suffice. I'll wait for 24 hours. deeptrivia ( talk) 17:48, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
The reason why it has to be "shared with" and not "shared between" is that the history of the region is not reducible to the histories of Iran, Afghanistan, and India. Baluchistan, for example, was only sporadically considered a part of the History of Iran, and never a part of the history of India until the late 19th century. Same with NWFP—it is not reducible to the histories of India and Afghanistan, although it was included in the histories of each during certain periods. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:40, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Their is nothing wrong with the lead. Deep him/herself said that the lead was reasonable before. IP198 23:46, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Deep, no one is saying that the history of Pakistan is not part of the history of India. Look at the History of India pg, it has the history of Pakistan in it. "Shared with", in my opinion, means that it is also part of the history of India, as well as Afghanistan. Iran i think is mainly their for cultural reasons. "Shared between" is incorrect because Afghanistan, India, Iran are modern nations. No one is trying to divide history modern borders. Look at the Delhi Sultanate, it is mainly within India, but is included in this article as it is important part of Pakistans history. IP198 00:09, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
I changed the lead to "The history of Pakistan—which for the period preceding the nation's founding in 1947, is also part of the histories of Afghanistan, India, and Iran—traces back to the beginnings of human life in South Asia." I hope this is good enough to end the dispute. IP198 17:48, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
Bravo Gentlemen a very well written article, It was very informative and there wasn't a hint of bias in it which I found pleasantly suprising.
You know what would have been better? If right after Partition, India abandoned the name "India" and took up the name "Bharat" not just as an official local name but as its international name for all countries to use and instead the term "India" should have been used by scholars and historians as a regional label (rather then "South Asia" or "Indian subcontinent" or whatever) with the term "Indian" being used to describe the collective history and heritage of the subcontinent countries of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal. That way, we would avoid this messy confusion. Ha ha. But that's not my main point for this post. I think, deeptrivia, you have to understand that Tombseye's point is that the area of what we call "Pakistan" is a region that has its own unique history which is true if you think about it. Just like South India has its own regional history distinct from other parts of the subcontinent or like northeastern India, the area called Pakistan occupies the bulk of the northwestern parts of the subcontinent, an area that historically served as South Asia's racial, cultural, linguistic, religious and sometimes national crossroads with other countries - in essence, its main gateway to the outside world. Even in pre-Partition histories, historians acknowledge this particular region as the subcontinent's share of the cultural highway that marked the region between the Middle East, Central Asia and South Asia (Xinjiang, Afghanistan, southern Turkistan, Khorasan, northwestern India). The reason we acknowledge this area as a separate history of a nation state is because, simply, it IS a nation state TODAY. The history of Qatar was an interesting fact that you mentioned. This isn't directly related, but if you read the history article for the related recent nation state of the UAE (United Arab Emirates), you'll also find that it mentions pre-colonial Arabian merchant history and the old Phoenician trade, etc as its own despite its nonexistence in that era. Afghan Historian 18:10, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
Also, as a country, it simply is an overlap between an Iranian speaking west and a Indo-Aryan speaking east. The history of the western areas still constitute essential parts of Pakistani history despite holding only 18% of our country's population. Also, that 18% isn't as insignificant as you think. Pashtuns have played a key role in our country's history and development. They were the ones who techinically introduced and entrenched Islamic culture into this region. Afghan kings definitely ruled parts of Punjab along with the frontier and Balochistan in their domains, particularly Ahmed Shah Durrani. Lahore and other parts of the Punjab are of strong significance to Afghanis and their history, despite being linguistically removed from them. There is definitely shared history here. But overall, yes, I agree with you that the region is "overall" (note the emphasis) historically closer to what is now India.
Afghan Historian
18:16, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
I've added a few tags on the article to make readers aware that there's an ongoing discussion related to the content of the article. I hope that we all atleast agree that that there is a discussion. deeptrivia ( talk) 22:32, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
I would like to invite everyone's attention to this edit "rv unilateral tagging". Tags added to make readers aware of a long ongoing discussion were simply removed before any of the discussions were concluded. This was not discussed on the talk page, and not even the editor that had added the tags was informed. deeptrivia ( talk) 03:56, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
Technically, Pakistan was created in just 1947, so its history should start from then or from the Pakistan movement. To lay claim to ancient Indian history as exclusively Pakistani history is patently absurd, but also understandable. Everyone wishes their nation had a past - and a glorious one too. ( Jvalant 09:04, 16 April 2007 (UTC))
Around half or less of the events relevant to Indian history take place in what is now Pakistan. It is as much our history as it is India's. No more no less. Afghan Historian 19:05, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
This is what the Goverment of Pakistan states [10]
“ | Pakistan emerged on the world map on August 14,1947. It has its roots into the remote past. Its establishment was the culmination of the struggle by Muslims of the South-Asian subcontinent for a separate homeland of their own and its foundation was laid when Muhammad bin Qasim subdued Sindh in 711 A.D. as a reprisal against sea pirates that had taken refuge in Raja Dahir's kingdom. | ” |
I think their should be one article for the preIslamic history of the subcontinent, but after 711 the history of the 2 countries is very different. The hero of one is the enemy of the other, and vice versa. IP198 01:40, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
The History of Pakistan, by the same token, gives more importance to to topics like Mehrgarh, the Indo-Greek kingdoms, the Parthians, ..., Ahmad Shah Durrani, Anglo-Afghan Wars. There is plenty of room for both histories, as has been observed countless times above by countless people in countless discussions. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 04:21, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
This article is a justification for Pakistan Theory, an entity that never existed before 1930, rather than History of Pakistan. Only rewrinting it on unbiased terms would be the solution. ~rAGU
Maybe this is the wrong place to bring it up but the indus civilization also had colonies in Turkmenistan so we can bring it up.-- Vmrgrsergr 04:41, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
Deeptrivia, Don't know what your act is dude, but it seems (from the history of this page) you've been repeating the same tired arguments for the last two years. Why don't you go bark up the History of India tree instead? As I have mentioned above, on the History of India page, they observe the following guidelines:
The History of Pakistan, by the same token, gives more importance to to topics like Mehrgarh, the Indo-Greek kingdoms, the Parthians, ..., Ahmad Shah Durrani, Anglo-Afghan Wars, as well at the history of the various republics of Pakistan. There is plenty of room for both histories of India and the region that is now Pakistan. So, my advice is that stop wreaking mischief on this page. If you are obsessed with this issue, bring it up on the Village Pump etc. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 20:36, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
Fowler&fowler, I know I should have expected the use of this kind of language, and silly phrases like "kingdoms that overlapped into India", instead of trying to understand the simple HIST 101 concept that using current-day boundaries for ancient history as simply wrong and academically unacceptable, especially if those borders have no historical/cultural/linguistic basis whatsoever. Anyway, because of these attempts to hide even the fact that this issue is being discussed, I think I would better discuss this elsewhere. deeptrivia ( talk) 20:59, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
My point is simply that this is not the best forum for that discussion. The problems exists for all South Asian national histories. India too didn't exist both as a name and as a polity before a certain time, but the history of events occurring in the region before that time is included in the history of India. I think this discussion belongs to some other forum, perhaps a South Asia-wide forum. I think experienced people like Nichalp, Ragib, Dab, and others should be asked what that best forum might be. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 23:30, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
I thought pakistani punjab was the cradle of the vedic civilization. I am surprised that there is no mention of it at all in the history of pakistan. The Indo-Greeks come suddenly after the Indus Valley Civilization, and there's a gap of a couple of thousand years.
==> Please remove this after reading.
I have page at http://www.travel-culture.com/pakistan/history.shtml which is chronology of Pakistan history with all dates. The Vedas (Ragveda) were written in Indus valley by Aryans and Punjab has no relation to it. Todays so called Punjab is in no way region that was in the past It was all Sindh in those days. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.143.113.212 ( talk) 01:29, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
Please do not remove this section. This is one single most import set of events that defined the future of Pakistan and for the next sixty or so years. This was the turning point when;
All the above elements are present to this day and are likely to continue for the foreseeable future. To say this is not important is to be naive of the underlying mechanics at work. Please read Justice Munir report before making up your mind. Both Urdu and English version are available under external links.
Indeed there are not very many events in the “1000 year” history of Pakistan which are so deserving of study to those interested in the development of the mind set of the Pakistani nation today and the problems it currently faces. Lastly, an event that caused the very first martial law in the history of the country is certainly worth mentioning in the history of a country which had martial laws for much of its life. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Malik07 ( talk • contribs) - 15:01, October 3, 2007
![]() | This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 |
This page is either always locked, or threatened to be locked.
Exactly which area is there bone of contention?
I haven't edited this page so I am clueless as to what this whole fight is about.
Please elaborate Mercenary2k 00:56, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
The term Ancient Pakistan is valid, I have provided sources countless of times, its not my fault that you wish to ignore the sources. However, the main reason for this page being locked is certain Indian users who cant stop editing the page to fit their POV.
--
Unre4L
ITY
02:33, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Certain users keep replacing the term Pakistan with "what is now Pakistan" or "modern Pakistan". There is only one Pakistan and I think its enough to simply say Pakistan. Even though Pakistan is a day older than India, we dont see statements like "What is now India"
I would like to point out that the article always referred to Pakistan as Pakistan, however recently an admin was banned, and the protection was lifted off this page. Before this page was protected, User Dangerous-Boy managed to edit the article and replace the terms. I am requesting comments from people who havent been involved in Edit wars here before.
Unre4L
ITY
02:41, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Whats your point- British India had TWO successor states. India was not the only one. India the country was born in 1947, and whenever you are referring to Republic of India, you should actually be saying "What is now India", because it clearly isnt what used to be India.
I really hoped that you would understand that Pakistan is not being used in a political context, but a term to describe the people if Pakistan, since India refers to the country 99% people will point to on a world map.
If you have a third term to refer to the Pakistani people, and which doesnt already clash with another group of people, Believe me, I will be delighted to hear it.
--
Unre4L
ITY
04:13, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Yes. Pakistanis were Indians, but only during the British Raj, and since Indian implies Republic of Indian, its best to stick with British Indian imo. Unre4L ITY 05:36, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
A compromise would be to use the term "What is now Pakistan" once in the introduction, and delete the 40 entries in the main text. Unre4L ITY 18:18, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Blueboar has a point. Nobleeagle [TALK] [C] 22:30, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
No offence Blueboar, but you have obviously not read up on any arguments. When people here refer to India, they refer to the country India, which didnt exist before 1947 either. Then people here prefer to think India before the British Raj was a country, when it was a subcontinent, never united as a country.
And since India is being used, it leaves us no choice but to refer to the land of Pakistan, as Pakistan no matter what era. Note, Pakistan is not being referred to in a political context, but the only term which doesnt clash with another group of people.
Consider this. A country in Asia calls itself Asia. Obviously there has to be a way to differentiate between the 2, not encouraging misleading people to promote the term.
Unre4L
ITY
23:58, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
Here I paste my reply regarding the "two successor states" story of Unre4L from Talk:History of India.
“ | The partition of British India in 1947 was interpreted by the United Nations as a case of state secession. Independent India assumed the seat of British India at the United Nations. Despite protests by Pakistan that India and Pakistan were both new states and that the old state had ceased to exist, Pakistan had to apply for new state membership. | ” |
This is turning out to be clearly a case of Argumentum_ad_nauseum. Conveniently ignoring all replies, and sticking to the same absurd argument borders on trolling. deeptrivia ( talk) 03:07, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
We have been through this argument before. Even if India is the successor state and Pakistan was carved out of India, (Which doesnt really makes sense since Pakistan gained independence a day before India), This only joins Pakistan and India, during the British Raj, not an era 5000 years ago, e.g Indus Valley, which has nothing to do with India, except it was a part of British Empire for a while. According to your logic, Iran can claim Indus Valley aswell.
It should be clear who the history belongs to, in this case, not Indians. --
Unre4L
ITY
03:17, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Hmm, again a paste from my comment here will do:
Some excerpts from the first page of Indica (Note: 1 stade = 231 m):
We are not historians, and at wikipedia we only reflect mainstream scholarship, and do not pass judgements on it. I do not propose any changes to wikipedia "according to my logic". This is called original research. So if you want to discuss whether it is right to call the Indus valley a part of historical India, please do that on pakhub. deeptrivia ( talk) 03:29, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
In its scope, this article is analogous to History of the Republic of India. (See also History of the People's Republic of China and History of the Republic of China vs. History of China and History of Taiwan. Article on Taiwan's early history is based on it being an island, not because it is a separate state presently). What I see here is a lot of redundant stuff that should better be covered elsewhere. Are there any reasonable justifications for having IVC, Vedic age, Mauryan empire, etc. on this article? deeptrivia ( talk) 04:26, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Guys. I Thought I made it clear that I wanted opinions of people who hadnt participated Edit warring this article, and gotten it locked in the first place. D-Boy, you are the reason for the "What is now Pakistan" statement coming up 40 times in this article, since it wasnt there before. You vandalised the page before the protection was put on the page, and now you are vandalising this discussion.
We already have a History of South Asia Article, within it contains links to the articles of History of Pakistan within its borders, and history of Republic of India, which seems to contain the history of South Asia. Doesnt make much sense.
I would appreciate it, if you didnt try to vandalise this article, and I am still looking for a comment from someone who wasnt behind this article getting locked.
--
Unre4L
ITY
11:57, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Thank you Mercenary2k. I would have nothing against calling Pakistani history, Indian, if there wasnt a country beside us called India. The term clashes and confuses everyone. History of Pakistan is not the political one. Its the history of the people. Unre4L ITY 12:00, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Pakistans People exist, do you agree? What do you want to call Pakistani people before British Raj?, because there certainly wasnt anything called India back then. I dont see how you dont find it misleading to call Pakistani ancestors Indian. India is the country you see on the world map, and this is what people refer to 99% of the times they say India. Pakistani ancestors had nothing to do with that India. Simply because Pakistan was a part of the British empire, doesnt mean it claims the Pakistani peoples history before the British Raj.
Besides, your edit was a case of Vandalism
[4]. You even put Ancient India in, and deleted quite a lot of the text to fit your POV.
--
Unre4L
ITY
20:49, 19 January 2007 (UTC)
Thats the political history of Pakistan, which can be found here, Pakistan. Like I have said before. This article is the history of the Pakistani people , so it has to cover everything. Why do you wish for us to ignore the history of our people, before 1947 ?. Unre4L ITY 15:43, 20 January 2007 (UTC)
Or something to that sort (someone with more knowledge of Pakistan should be able to do better than that. It just should be clear and not misleading. Nobleeagle [TALK] [C] 03:10, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Just thought I would mention the scheme britannica has adopted on this for comparison. See
this and
this.
deeptrivia (
talk)
00:47, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Just thought I would point out something really obvious. Britannica doesnt link the history of India page to Republic of India. And it makes it very clear its referring to the Indian Subcontinent. Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 12:44, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Oh, that can surely be done.. but this discussion is on the scope of History of Pakistan.
deeptrivia (
talk)
13:11, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I doubt you would support renaming the
History of India article to
History of Indian Subcontinent. I will let you take your words back.
Regarding this discussion. This article has been vandalised by D-Boy, and does need to be edited. History of Pakistan is the history of the Pakistani people and their ancestors. You cant remove any of our history because it doesnt satisfy your POV. --
Unre4L
ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ
UT
15:17, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Just a Question to all Indians here. Why are you guys so obsessed with Pakistani related articles anyways? Do we come to Indian articles and start changing things around? This Article certainly requires a lot of work and major re-structuring but your continual interference has shown that your sole purpose to edit Pakistani related articles is not to make them better but put in mis-information. Mercenary2k 21:09, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Well, I never change anything in the India article, but I do suggest changes. However I certainly dont go around vandalising the India article. Besides, this article might need structure changes, but we dont have anything in this article which doesnt belong here already. Some people are trying hard to get this article deleted altogether. -- Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 21:25, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure there is any reason why there is a need to highlight the Indian posters here as they all vary and its divisive rather than constructive. Some are quite willing to work and compromise and nationality shouldn't be a factor imo. Some nationalist sentiment may exist with some, but working together to find solutions is a better way to go about this and dialectic exchange should work as it then breaks down to what is viable or not. Being Indian doesn't equal nationalist as writers and historians like Romila Thapar are pretty neutral on how they view matters (probably because they study things in detail). The main question here appears to be: Is there a regional history and can it be subsumed into some larger history and if so why or why not? For example, if one thing is taking place in Sri Lanka and another in Pakistan, how are the two part of a single history? From what context? Modern historians write from a starting point of current national boundaries and also consider historic political entities. This article includes the periods that link Pakistan to India and then also consider events that don't. I don't see anything wrong with this approach as it is both realistic and factual. I also don't see the point of adding information that has no real relevance (the Magadha situation) to the region. Tombseye 21:56, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Mercenary2k your question is valid and here is my perspective on it . Please appreciate that there is a very large living population of Indians who have been displaced from their traditional homelands in what is now Pakistan .While Pakistan has achieved an ethnic cleansing of unparalleled magnitude changing the religious and demographic composition to have a 1-2% non Muslims left , were you to look at census figure of 1921 ,1941 ,you may be amazed yourself .
Therefore while it may have been possible to ethnically cleanse the Pakistan areas of Hindus and Sikhs, how are you going to ethnically cleanse the collective social , cultural , historical , consciousness and memory of this displaced population of Hindus and Sikhs .Please understand then that what you consider exclusively Pakistani , is erroneous .Indians are only dealing with their own History .
Similarly refugees from India who now living in Pakistan have roots in India , this same rationale applies to them as well .
The road taken by many Pakistani posters on wikipedia is indicative , completely skip Hindu ,Sikh reference , or undermine it ,sometimes to ridiculous levels . Skip grom Indus valley to Islamic period ??!
On a different note Pakistani support for Palestinians right to their homeland seems contradictory and is a related issue here then considering the question you have raised . Pakistan is a country established with ethnic cleansing of its indigenous population, that denies a homeland to its own Pakistani Muslims stranded in Bangladesh for last 40 years .If Pakistani support to Palestinian homeland is based on principals, then let it first recognize the homeland rights of Hindus and Sikhs from Pakistan, or the Bihari Muslims stranded in Bangladesh first . Please let me have your views on this because it relates to whom the historical heritage of what you refer to as Pakistani belongs.
Articles must not be vandalized, but lets have some balance here my friend.Regards Intothefire 05:50, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
Nobody is skipping Hindu and Sikh references, but out of the 3.5 Million [5] [6] [7] [8] people who left Pakistan, why do 160 million have to be denied their history? -- Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 09:05, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
So do you agree that a distinctly Indian culture did exist from Punjab-Sindh to Bengal-Assam to Tamil Nadu-Kerala? Nobleeagle [TALK] [C] 06:30, 24 January 2007 (UTC)
Tombseye is more or less correct on this matter. He has in fact visited Pakistan and as a non-South Asian can provide a neutral voice on the matter. Pakistan, specifically eastern Pakistan, is apart of Indian civilization.
Balochistan though a key part of Pakistan by land mass, is historically just a transit region between South Asia, West Asia and Central Asia, overall its people are tied to Middle Easterners rather then
Indians/
South Asians. The NWFP is often tied to India in ancient times but with the arrivals of Pashtuns in the first millenium of the Common Era onwards, develops equal ties with Central Asia and the Middle East. But yes, Pakistan is the northwestern segment of a common ethno-linguistic/cultural continuoum from the Khyber pass to
Bengal, from
Kashmir to
Sri Lanka.
Afghan Historian
00:35, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
No need to merge an articles. Pakistan constitutes the bulk of the region historically known as northwestern India and has a unique history of its own, much like how South India has its own history or Northeast India has its own history. Just keep a History of Pakistan article, but make sure to include the words or something to the effect of "the area now known as Pakistan" or "northwestern South Asia", etc. And Tombseye is right, the term "India", "Hindustan", "Indikos", et all, originally referred to the part of the subcontinent now known as Pakistan. With regards to Peshawar and the Middle East, I confess I dont know exactly how one would define what constitutes a "Middle Eastern city". Afghan Historian 21:59, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
True, true. Mainstream Pakistani culture is generally what comes from the eastern more strictly South Asian areas. But it would be wrong to deny the influence of the western Pakistanis on the trends of this region. The Pashtuns have played a key part in the construction of this country, whether it be the Pakistan movement, the army, politics, literature, food, etc. One of Pakistan's greatest 20th century poets, Ghani Khan is a Pashtun. The chapli kebab from the NWFP has become a common fast food snack in Pakistan, much more so then the South Asian samosa and in the same manner as the hamburger in America. It was the Pashtuns who were among the first peoples to consolidate Islam in this area, as well as in greater northern India in general. Part of the reason why many Indians want to put Pashtun areas within a "greater India" is because of these historical contributions to Indian Islam made by the Afghans. That is why I've decided to view the Afghans as a non-South Asian group of people with undeniable constant historical links to the Islamic culture of the subcontinent. Besides, some of the Iranian ancestors of the Pasthuns, the Scythians, are also the ancestors of many Punjabi and Rajput clans as well. Baloch food is also becoming widely popular in Pakistan and many Baloch have reached prominent positions in the Pakistani establishment, despite current problems with the province and certain over emphasis on Punjabis. It would be wrong to buy into commonalities and declare South Asian Urdu Islamic culture as the norm of Pakistan, and deny the impact of these periphary Iranic groups. These areas, however, were incorporated into mainstream India by the British, during the 19th century, as peripheral border regions to protect their Indian empire from foreign attack. They may have had little ties with mainstream India, but they served the British geo-political purpose well. The northeastern areas of modern India, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Tripura, Burma etc. were also incorporated in this fashion, as northeastern buffers against China and Southeast Asia. Had Balochistan been a bit stronger, it could have easily seceded from India and developed as its own country, much like Burma. Afghan Historian 23:40, 27 January 2007 (UTC)
Sure, Pakistan is fast developing a more integrated culture that mixes all people together. Any description of modern Pakistan would be incomplete without mentioning the Pashtun and Baloch influence. There's also no denying of strong historical Afghan influences on what is now Pakistan. These historical influences, however, did not end on the Radcliffe line. Rohilkhand would probably have more Pashtun influence than Cholistan. It is hard to find things about the regions that constitute Pakistan on the east of the "cultural divide" that are not applicable to most of the rest of Indo-Gangetic plains. It should be easier to find things about Baluchistan and NWFP that do not apply on the rest of Pakistan. How important should the modern political borders be in the context of the long history that this region has? Same applies to Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, etc. deeptrivia ( talk) 01:11, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
What Tombseye says is correct with regards to Pakistan, but we must remember, India, as a whole, doesnt have one common history, according to his definition of overlapping history between India and Pakistan. Different events happened in different parts of India. Northwestern India (ie; Rajputana, Punjab and Kashmir) have a historical trend more or less identical to what is in the history of Pakistan. South India has a history that is somewhat different from other parts of India. Northeast India has a history that is almost 100% different from mainstream North India. Like, what happened in what is now Northwestern India is identical or very similar to what happened in Pakistan, even with the unique "Indus-oriented" events taken into consideration. What happened in South India is very different from what happened in North India. For example, the Chola Empire has nothing to do with North India. The Ahom invasion is unrelated to the affairs of the South Indians or the North Indians. While the history is generally the same, the various little differences are not just between India and Pakistan, but between all the different regions of the subcontinent. Pakistan constitutes the bulk of what would have been considered the region of northwestern India pre-Partition, so of course it has a local distinct history. Same with other regions. But its not like, all of India had a 100% common set of events going on that differed from Pakistan. India is a collection of related South Asian regions. Pakistan constitutes a distinct region of South Asia, the northwest, where the subcontinent and both Central Asia and the Middle East meet. Therefore of course you'll have a distinctive history there with a meeting place of ethnicities and languages. Some of what happened in Pakistan may not have occurred in the rest of the subcontinent, yes, so it may not make a lot of sense to include it in a history of India. But, there were parts of India, such as Punjab and Rajputana, where those events did have such an effect, as opposed to other Indian areas. Its for those regions that we should include it. And, Pakistan was in many ways the focal point and base for events in the subcontinent. Much if not most of what happened in this region would undoubtedly affect what happened in the rest of the subcontinent. The drying up of the Indus resulted in the shift of early South Asian civilization to the Gangetic valley. The Aryan migrations into this area soon culminated into an Aryan migration and Aryanization of almost the entire subcontinent. Persian Achaemenid invasions may have only politically affected the Punjab and Sindh, but they allowed for things from those areas to reach the rest of the subcontinent. Persian ideas with regards to political science, architecture, art and certain religious practices soon spread to other parts of the subcontinent, giving certain Indian groups the structure they needed for building a vast and stable pan-subcontinent empire such as the Maurya empire and influenced later Indian poltical science such as the ideas in the Arthashastra. You had art such as the Mauryan Lion columns and the columns at Pataliputra, which certainly had origins in the architecture of Persepolis. Greek invasions allowed for the diffusion of Greek traits in architecture and drama to diffuse. Scythian invasions in this area precipitated Scythian spillover throughout the entire region. Same with the Parthian invasions. Now what may have happened in certain parts of northern and central India did not have an effect in the northwest. The Gupta Empire didnt really touch the northwest such as Punjab or Sindh. The Sassanians, ehh, were probably the one northwestern event that didnt really effect the whole subcontinent or most of it with their control in the area, but there was a distinct blending of Indian and Persian culture here. But, the Muslim invasions did. Arab and Ghaznavid invasions set the stage for the gradual Islamicization of India. The Mongol dip probably didnt make an effect either, but then again that was more in the northern reaches of the Northwest frontier province, that didnt have much tie to India proper anyway. Yet Timur's invasions did, as did the Mughal and Persian invasions of Nadir Shah. The Durrani invasion didnt seem to have much effect in the rest of the country, but it did set the stage for the anarchy in the north that allowed for the competition between Ranjit Singh and the British. Afghan Historian 20:38, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
As for the regions that dont have direct or even existent connection to the Indian civilization, such as the North West Frontier Province (which in Pre-Pashtun days, actually did via Taxila and the ancient Mahajanapadas) and more importantly, Balochistan (which is tied to Persia), these are probably the main regions that keep up the need for a separate History of Pakistan article. Balochistan does have events that do not tie in with India. It has a separate kind of culture and civilization too. Balochistan has always been known to be a border country between India and Persia. But the thing is, where is this history even mentioned in the History of Pakistan article? The reason some people want to merge the history articles together is that the pre-1947 history in the Pakistan article is almost the same as the history in the pre-1947 India article. Almost every event overlaps. Even the Durrani event is shown, as is the Hun invasions. At most the only discrepancies are the Mongol dip in the 1200's and the greater details involving the Arab invasion of Sindh, even though the India article also talks at shorter length about this event as a whole. Someone needs to be more indepth about the distinctly non-Indian aspects of Pakistan's history when writing this article. We cant just expect to keep to articles separate that almost talk about the same thing, word for word, top to bottom. I guess all this hullaballoo comes from the writing of these two articles. Afghan Historian 20:38, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
No, not exactly deep trivia. I think a separate History of Pakistan article talking about pre-1947 history is needed. I just think we have to trim and stuff from and to both India and pakistan articles to make sure they dont overlap almost 100% of the time. Afghan Historian 16:29, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
The History of India proper article talking about pre-1947 history almost matches the History of Pakistan article in pre-1947 content, word for word. Regardless the region of Pakistan is in many ways its own region of the subcontinent, much as South India or the Northeast is, while still tied to civilization of greater India. I think we can have a History of Pakistan article where we can talk about the history in both the Indic and Iranic regions and see how they work together to form what was once Northwest India and greater Iran but now constitutes a separate state. We should trim all miscellaneous northwest related Indian material from the History of India page and instead put back all post-1947 material fromt the History of the Republic of India article. The Indian history books talking about the northwestern Indian historical events such as the Sassanid invasion, the Indo-Parthian era, the era of the Indo-Greeks, the Durranis, the Pashtuns, the Baloch, etc, were all written in the era preceding 1947, when what is now Pakistan was still apart of India. Its 2007 now, 60 years later. We have to treat these histories and label them according to there effects and legacy of today. Here's what the History of Pakistan article should kind of look like from the Table of Contents, with regards to pre-1947 material; this isnt exact, its kind of sloppy, but it should be close enough: I. Mehgarh/Prehistoric II. Indus Valley Civilization III. Aryan migration and Vedic Civilization IV. Mahajanapadas (very very brief however as these areas were exposed to foreign domination early on, but talk about Gandhara, etc.) V. Achaemenid invasions VI. Alexander's Invasion and Selucid Period
a. Porus and Omphius b. Gedrosia and Arachosia (now part of Pakistani Balochistan) c. Pactyans (Pashtuns?)
VII. Mauryan Empire
a. Ashoka and Buddhism b. Taxila
VIII. Indo-Greeks and Bactrians, etc.
a. Greco Buddhism b. Gandhara School of Art c. More on Taxila?
XV. Indo-Scythians X. Indo-Parthians XI. Kushan Empire
a. Kanishka and Buddhist revival
XII. Gupta Empire (kind of brief) XIII. Indo-Sassanians Afghan Historian 22:54, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
I am bloody sick and tired of this garbage is there anyway we can get these brats banned please? All the time I see things changed, without even posting anything in the talk section...talk about insecure.
User:BK2006 - 02:03, January 27, 2007
Actually, one might plausibly make an identical argument about India before its independence, asserting that there never was an "India" per se, but rather an immense patchwork of ethnic groups, principalities, and empires before independence. I'm not sure you want to go there. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.119.255.31 ( talk • contribs) - 21:31, May 23, 2007
The article makes zero mention of the period 1947-1955. There were significant incidents during this period, like the 1954 election, the unstable democracy that saw a surprisingly high number of cabinets being organized and ousted. It also saw the big cultural movement : Language movment, that was the first rift between the West Pakistan and the East Pakistan. Considering the significance of the time period, it is surprising that the article mentions nothing about the time period. -- Ragib 10:05, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
In general, the coverage between 1947 and 1971 leaves a lot to be desired. And the 70s and 80s need a lot of expansion too. I agree with Tombseye -- this is the kind of things this article is supposed to be about. I quote myself from above: "The entire history of Pakistan movement is summarized in a tiny paragraph, and there are similar tiny paragraphs on Pakistan resolution, partition, and such events that led to the creation of Pakistan. " Pakistan" serves as the "main article" for the history of Pakistan after it was created (sec 11)! The article covers next to nothing of the history between 1947 and 1971 -- an eventful time when Pakistan fought two wars. The Indo-Pakistani War of 1947 is not mentioned at all, and one line is written about Indo-Pakistani War of 1965. There is little information about Pakistan in the 1980s. There is little economic history, society, advances in technology, agriculture, etc, little about the problems like the one in Balochistan, etc." These things will take an entire article to cover satisfactorily, and such an article is badly needed. (This would be comparable to History of the Republic of India or History of the People's Republic of China.) deeptrivia ( talk) 16:55, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
Half the article should be about pre-Partition history and the other half should describe purely Pakistani history such as the Pakistan movement, the early years, the middle years plus the coup, the first two wars, the constitutional struggle, the ethno-linguistic clashes, the East Bengal independence movement, the simultaneous tensions in Balochistan, the 80's, etc. While much of the Indian history in Pakistan is local based, as much if not a little more is tied with the mainstream history of the subcontinent. All common eras to the subcontinent such as the Indus civilization, Vedic India/Aryans, Alexander, maybe Achaemenids, Mauryans, Kushans, Guptas, and Muslim invasions, (minus Arab conquest of Sindh) should be rather brief and northwestern India-specific events should get more coverage. At the end of pre-1947/Muslim League history, there should be a note stating something to the effect of "for more information on pre-independence Pakistani history, see "History of India", "History of Afghanistan" etc. Especially since most of the detailed pre-1947 history is tied to Indian and Afghani eras. History of Balochistan should also be added to external links. Afghan Historian 21:48, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
I've added a paragraph on early proto-dentistry in Mehrgarh. I've also added the link to the announcement—a one-page pdf—in the journal Nature (April 2006). The Nature article is fascinating and well worth reading. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 09:04, 8 February 2007 (UTC)
Because of the blitz of edit warring, I have protected the page. Thanks. -- Ragib 19:02, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Thank you. Some people want to bombard the article by using terms like "Modern Pakistan" and "What is now Pakistan", at least 30 times in the article. Pakistan has been known by dozens of names; and "India" for less than 100 years. I dont see the point of doing this, however the "modern Pakistan" explanation has been given at the top of the article, and these nationalists are still not happy. -- Unre4L ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ UT 20:00, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Its not confusing. Just like "Ancient India", when there was no land on the face of this plant called "India" until 1850. Ancient Pakistan is a valid term, and to make Indians happy, an explanation has already been given. Only certain people seem to be making the compromises here, and you are not one of them. I dont remember ever editing anything on the Indian history article, I always discussed the matter. Please make this a habit also.
Your edits would be classed as vandalism since you are not doing anything constructive, but editing (in groups mind you) to promote your own agenda.
--
Unre4L
ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ
UT
22:39, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
Why do you keep posting this revised map all the time? Does it never occur to you how all the spellings are exact same as modern maps?. I.e Its a translated map.
Here is an Original British Map from 1808. Note, how the term India was used for the Ocean only, and there is NO land called India.
http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/historical/asia_1808.jpg
Here is an Arabic map. Once again note, No India.
http://www.conncoll.edu/academics/departments/relstudies/290/theory/worldmaps/118.gif
--
Unre4L
ﺍﹸﻧﺮﮮﺍﻝ
UT
23:00, 23 February 2007 (UTC)
No one is trying to 'mislead or confuse people'. The first sentence mentions that Pakistan was founded in 1947. Why is their a need to mention modern day or present day every single time? Should we change the aticle of Lahore, and mention that it is located in modern day Pakistan? More on this later. IP198 16:36, 6 March 2007 (UTC)
The lead is too detailed, but also omits the quite important post 1947 event summaries. -- Ragib 12:48, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
After discussions with user:Deeptrivia, I added a clarification in first sentence of the article: "The history of Pakistan—which for the period preceding the nation's founding in 1947 is (presented here as) the history of the region that is now Pakistan and therefore overlaps with the histories of Afghanistan, India, and Iran—traces back to the beginnings of human life in South Asia." [1] However, that was reverted by user:Bakasuprman with an edit summary, "(Pakistan cant have a history so long if the word was not coined up until 1933. nadirali-esque edits are not appreciated)." Since I had discussed some of these issues with user:Deeptrivia, I will (if he doesn't mind) post part of that earlier discussion here.
First, is there precedence for such a history? Yes, there is. Of the four large encyclopedias, three—Encarta, Columbia Encyclopedia, and World Book Encyclopedia—do have a histories of Pakistan, more or less along the lines of the Wikipedia article (although less detailed). The Encarta article, written by Saeed Shafqat, full professor at Columbia University, begins with:
“ | The area of present-day Pakistan has a long history of human settlement as the cradle of the Indus Valley civilization, the earliest-known civilization in South Asia. This Bronze Age culture flourished in the area of the Indus River Valley from about 2500 to 1700 bc. The Indus River is considered the lifeblood of Pakistan, and the ancient culture that arose there serves as an icon of Pakistan’s territorial identity. Important archaeological sites in Pakistan include Mohenjo-Daro (Sindhi for “Mound of the Dead”), in Sind Province, and Harappā, near the Ravi River (a tributary of the Indus) in Punjab Province.
Pakistan’s cultural identity is traced to the centuries of Muslim rule in the region. In AD 711 Mohammad bin Qasim, an Arab general and nephew of Hajjaj, ruler of Iraq and Persia, conquered Sind and incorporated it into the Umayyad Caliphate. Thereafter Muslims continued to rule areas of present-day Pakistan for almost 1,000 years. For the first 300 years the region of Sind was the only part of the Indian subcontinent that was under Muslim rule.... |
” |
The World Book Encyclopedia article on Pakistan, written by Ayesha Jalal, Professor at Tufts and author of The Sole Spokesman, begins with,
“ | Pakistan has a long and complex history, dating back at least 8,000 years to the Mehrgarh civilization in present-day Baluchistan. Later, around 2500 B.C., one of the world's first great civilizations developed in the Indus Valley in what are now Pakistan and northwestern India. Ruins of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro (also spelled Moenjodaro), the two major cities of the civilization, lie in present-day Pakistan. The ruins show that both cities were large and well-planned. By about 1700 B.C., the Indus Valley civilization had gradually declined. | ” |
Similarly, the Columbia Encyclopedia (6th edition, 2001-2005) has a History of Pakistan which begins with:
“ | The northwest of the Indian subcontinent, which now constitutes Pakistan, lies athwart the historic invasion routes through the Khyber, Gumal, and Bolan passes from central Asia to the heartland of India, and for thousands of years invaders and adventurers swept down upon the settlements there. The Indus valley civilization, which flourished until c.1500 B.C., was one of the region’s earliest civilizations. The Aryans, who surpassed the Indus, were followed by the Persians of the Achaemenid empire, who by c.500 B.C. reached the Indus River. Alexander the Great, conqueror of the Persian empire, invaded the Punjab in 326 B.C. | ” |
These articles are written by people in mainstream scholarship, tenured professors at major American universities. The point is that it doesn't matter that Pakistan or Bangladesh were not even a gleam in anyone's eyes before the 20th century, the histories of the regions now occupied by these countries can nonetheless be written, and will necessarily be different—not by POV, but by their focus—from a larger history of (historical) India or South Asia. That has already begun to happen with new sub-topics like Mehrgarh, which were excavated in the 1970s and 80s, long after the partition, and whose current archaeological expertise is either in Pakistan or in France, but not in India. The emerging historiography is already focusing (and will likely focus even more) on links to other contemporaneous Neolithic cultures in Iran and Central Asia rather than later cultures in the region of current-day India.
The History of Pakistan can be written by focusing on all the histories that intersect in the region that is now Pakistan. That means that sometimes that history will be a part of the History of Punjab. Other times, that history might be part of a history of Iran or Aghanistan. For example, Mehrgarh was a part of the History of Neolithic Iran in its early phase, but became a part of the History of the Indus Civilization (as a precursor) in its later phase. The problem arises when someone tries to impute a historical or cultural imperative to the region that is now Pakistan and looks for seeds of Pakistan in events of long ago. That is not what we are doing on this page. We are simply presenting the history of the region. Lastly, as pointed out perceptively to me by user:Deeptrivia, we are not making any false connections, or providing an artificial unity to the history, just because the region later became a country.
I am therefore undoing Bakasuprman's reversion. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 03:30, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Fowler&Fowler did you get a chance to consider rephrasing the lead yet? Arguments such as " The point is that it doesn't matter that Pakistan or Bangladesh were not even a gleam in anyone's eyes before the 20th century," could easily be debated (e.g., I presented several sources like UC Berkeley, Britannica, who start Pakistan's history from the 1930s, and explicitly point people to Indian history for events before that), but for the moment, I would suggest let's try to fix up problems that could be easily be fixed. Let's at least have a disclaimer telling people properly what the article is dealing with at the moment. One problem, as I mentioned yesterday, is that for A and B to "overlap", we should have some notion of separate existence of A and B first. deeptrivia ( talk) 04:53, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Fowler, you are putting too much detail in the lead. Mentioning that Pakistan was founded in 1947 is enough, no need to put in "as the history of the region that is now Pakistan" as well in the same sentence. IP198 17:54, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Aparently, we have had this tag at the top of the page since December. And there is only one missing citation in the whole of article. So, can't we just remove the disputed text and the annoying template altogether? -- Isles Cape Talk 20:27, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Hi Deeptrivia, What are those things that are back? Let's set them right. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
PS. Also, how did the article get a "B" rating? Is there a discussion for that? Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:59, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
In the Golden Age section of the article there is a paragraph:
“ | During those centuries ethnic composition of the region remained in flex until the 7th century, when it was stabilized. Rajputs, Jats, and Gujjars became integral part of the population. With the mixing of the Iranian people, a physical feature became predominated in the Baloch region which resemble to Iranic or other Caucasoid races to the west. This made people of the Baloch region distinct from the rest of the South Asia. These Caucasoid physical features beccome more prominent with the movement of Pakhtuns and Balochis. cited paper | ” |
The cited paper compares the allele frequencies of four genes (which although popular in recent anthropological studies are but four out of the 25,000+ genes in the human genome): HLA-A, -B, -DQB1, and -DRB1 and showed that for those genes the Baloch of Iran are very similar to Baloch and Brahui of Pakistan, and concluded, "This may reflect an admixture of Brahui and Baloch ethnic groups of Pakistan in the Balochistan province of Iran." It says nothing about Caucasoid which is not a molecular-biological term, but rather a much older physical-anthropological notion. The paragraph above claims that "this makes the Baloch region distinct from the rest of South Asia." The paper in fact makes exactly the opposite point, that the Baloch of Iran have an admixture of South Asia. I am therefore removing that entire paragraph which is full of bogus surmising. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:42, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
PS. I have also removed the next paragraph, which is full of similar surmising:
“ | It is surmised that Iranian tribes existed in western Pakistan during a very early age and that Pakhtun tribes were inhabitants around the area of Peshawar prior to the period of Alexander the Great as Herodotus refers to the local peoples as the "Paktui" and as a fearsome pagan tribe similar to the Bactrians. Iranian Balochi tribes did not arrive at least until the first millennium CE and would not expand as far as Sindh until the 2nd millennium. | ” |
Fowler&fowler «Talk» 14:47, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
PPS. Finally, Encyclopaedia Britannica's section on "Neolithic Agriculture in the Indus Valley and Baluchistan," says:
“ | Indo-Iranian borderlands form the eastern extension of the Iranian Plateau and in some ways mirror the environment of the Fertile Crescent (the arc of agricultural lands extending from the Tigris-Euphrates system to the Nile valley) in the Middle East. Across the plateau, lines of communication existed from early antiquity, which would suggest a broad parallelism of developments at both the eastern and western extremities. During the late 20th century, knowledge of early settlements on the borders of the Indus system and Baluchistan was revolutionized by excavations at Mehrgarh and elsewhere. The group of sites at Mehrgarh provides evidence of some five or six thousand years of occupation comprising two major periods, the first from the 8th through the 6th millennium BC and the second from the 5th through the 4th (and possibly the 3rd) millennium. | ” |
Fowler&fowler «Talk» 00:16, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
Well, I was responding to many things (and being in a hurry didn't clarify). I was replying among others to your statement in a section above, "At any rate, Balochistan has been more of a buffer zone between India and Persia rather than a part of either. On the other hand, Punjab and Sind (currently over 80% of the population, and historically a much higher share of population of the region) have been parts of India proper, in fact, perhaps the only "India" known to most Persians and Greeks." Sorry if I misinterpreted you, but I'm not sure what point you were trying to make there, if not that Baluchistan shouldn't be a part of the History of the-region-that-is-now-Pakistan, because the History of the-region-that-is-now-Pakistan should really be the history of the historically populated part of Pakistan, which in any case is subsumed in the History of (historical) India. The point I was trying to make is that since Mehrgarh is in Baluchistan, that since Baluchistan was not always sparsely populated and therefore historically unimportant (given the history of Mehrgarh and its later morphing into IVC), that since Baluchistan was not considered a part of (historical) India until the British acquired it, (or at the very earliest until the Mughals sporadically subdued it), that since no old world map includes it in Indikos, Indicus, Indiana, etc., but rather as Gedrosia, it makes an even stronger case that the History of the-region-that-is-now-Pakistan be not just the History of (historical) India, but rather a mix of Histories of (historical) Iran, (historical) Afghanistan and (historical) India.
Yes, I know about the Indian subcontinent all too well (having copy edited it recently and having removed claims that Baluchistan was not a part of the subcontinent because it was not on the Indian plate). And I apologize if there was a spill-over of my frustration from copy editing that article. You are right that what I wrote above doesn't apply to the the second paragraph that I removed. I will put the second paragraph in. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:34, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
The lead of this article is could be made more accurate without making it too detailed. We had agreed to some changes, which have not yet been implemented. I am proposing some changes here again. Please point out any problems or inaccuracies in this lead:
The only major change here is that, as Fowler&Fowler and I had agreed, the assertion that Pakistan had a pre-1947 history that "overlapped" with Indian, Iranian and Afghan histories, is removed. Again, as we can see in the lead itself, writing a general pre-1947 history for Pakistan is inherently problematic and is best not done. Baluchistan and Punjab have served entirely different roles in history, and now "the region" as a whole is generalized as a gateway to the Middle East. For now, let's see if this lead is fine. deeptrivia ( talk) 16:07, 16 March 2007 (UTC)
I have reworded the lead and added the information about the partition of British India in a footnote (which is where I think it belongs and not in the lead proper). The new lead sentences now read:
“ | The history of Pakistan—which for the period preceding the country's creation in 1947 [3] is shared with those of Afghanistan, India, and Iran—traces back to the beginnings of human life in South Asia. [4] The ancient lands of present-day Pakistan belonged to both the heartland and frontier of the ancient South Asian world. [5] Spanning the western expanse of the Indian subcontinent and the eastern borderlands of the Iranian plateau, the region served both as the fertile ground of some of South Asia's major civilizations and the gateway to the Middle East and Central Asia. | ” |
I think this gives a balanced view of the history and doesn't over-stress the connection to the Middle-East etc. Also, I have replaced the word "overlaps" with "shared." The links Afghanistan, India, and Iran now link to the current-day countries, and so the statement that the history is shared with those countries is accurate. I have also added 6 maps of the region from 1765 to 1909 (five from the Imperial Gazetteer of India) in the Colonial Era section, which show that what is current-day Pakistan was not covered in the traditional definition of India, or for that matter Afghanistan or Iran. Therefore, the words, "... was shared with those of ..." is more accurate than the previous version "... is a part of the histories of Afghanistan, India, and Iran," since regions like Baluchistan, were not exclusively a part of the histories of Afghanistan or Iran. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 00:01, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
I think the new lead is good, though i did not see a problem with a previous one. The one word that i believe should be taken out is "heartland". The heartland of South Asia is the Delhi, UP region not Pakistan. IP198 02:41, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
I am not using the term politically correct in the usual pejorative sense, but in the sense of inclusive language. Political correctness has a good side too, since it is based on sensitivity to the various implications of a term. Words like "African-American" (for "black," and "black" itself for "Negro"), "Disabled" (for "crippled"), "Mute" (for "dumb"), "Mentally handicapped," (for "retarded"), "Down's syndrome," (for "mongoloid"), were all considered politically correct once, and they are all standard usage now. We are very much concerned with usage on Wikipedia: try changing disabled to crippled. The OED is very much a test of usage, not political correctness in the pejorative sense. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 00:19, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
Obviously I am not, otherwise, I would not have used "Indian subcontinent" in the lead. "South Asia" as I have mentioned before, is used more often in the context of history. If you do a similar Google search on "South Asia" you get 848,000 hits. Anyway, I don't think any more changes need to be made in the lead. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 02:18, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
I'd like to get various editors' opinion (especially the ones who have worked on this page like Tombseye and IP198) of the following idea. Since this article includes both the history of the Pakistan region until 1947 and that of the republic(s) of Pakistan thereafter, and since it is beginning to burgeon, I thought it might be a good idea to split the page into two pages: History of the Pakistan region (which would have the history of the region until 1947) and History of the (Islamic) Republic of Pakistan, which would have the history from 1947 onwards, but with (and this is important), the History of Pakistan page redirecting to History of the Pakistan region. In addition, the History of the Pakistan region page would have a dab note at the top saying, "For the history of the region after 1947, please refer to History of the (Islamic) Republic of Pakistan".
I'd also like to know what you feel about having a History of South Asia page, which would include more histories and be written along the lines of Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. South Asia: A Timeline In Art History 8000BC-Present. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 18:19, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
Is it really necessary to have two articles? If their are two articles i believe some people will want to remove the pre 47 Pakistan article, and just keep the post 47 one. Also if size is the problem we can summarize some of the sections. if that is not enough what we could do is create a seperate article for the preIslamic history of Pakistan. You cant have an article for the Islamic Republic of Pakistan without mentioning the reason why it was createad. To do that you would have to start with Muhammad bin Qasims liberation of Sindh, all the way to partition. As well as adding post 47 material.
btw fowler, i was looking at the pg history, and i think u have done a great job on this article. IP198 22:20, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
P.S - I dont mind their being a South Asia history pg. IP198 22:21, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
Deep, while that was funny, i dont know why you didnt take the idea seriously. I think the article is fine as it is but you want to change it to start from 47. Thats fine, buy you have to mention the reason why Pakistan was createad. It boils down to this the founders did not create Pakistan because of the Indus Valley Civilization, Gandhara, etc. They createad Pakistan because Muslims ruled the subcontinent for centuries, and they did not want to be part of a "Hindu Raj". No history of Pakistan will be complete without mentioning Muslim rule, which begins from Muhammad bin Qasim.
btw how is Muhammad bin Qasim viewed in India? IP198 17:33, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
Great work so far Fowler! You've clearly put in a lot of work and I'll help when I can and time allows. The Pashtuns article took a lot of out me in terms of free time and I was going to work on the Persians and help with History of Azerbaijan and this article as well I guess! I'd recommend not making two articles as that will confuse laypersons and I think anyone with any semblance of comprehension will understand that the modern nation called Pakistan has inherited a history that is both its own and is often shared with various neighbors, which is probably universally true. Great lead by the way. Very complete. So far the article is really shaping up and I guess at some point will constitute a good article at this rate! I'll check in from time to time and help out and if there's anything specific you need help with let me know. Probably more citations would be cool as well. I added the bibliography at the end as I consulted many of those books when I wrote some of the previous versions of this article. If possible, citing from them and other sources could help matters further. I like your neutral academic rendition and wording. Good job! Tombseye 17:30, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Although I won't like doing this, I might have to put a neutrality tag on this article. "shared with" is almost synonymous with "overlaps with" which we had decided to remove. Why can't we adopt NPOV here? I think a convincing explanation on "shared with" more accurate than "shared between" will suffice. I'll wait for 24 hours. deeptrivia ( talk) 17:48, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
The reason why it has to be "shared with" and not "shared between" is that the history of the region is not reducible to the histories of Iran, Afghanistan, and India. Baluchistan, for example, was only sporadically considered a part of the History of Iran, and never a part of the history of India until the late 19th century. Same with NWFP—it is not reducible to the histories of India and Afghanistan, although it was included in the histories of each during certain periods. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 22:40, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Their is nothing wrong with the lead. Deep him/herself said that the lead was reasonable before. IP198 23:46, 24 March 2007 (UTC)
Deep, no one is saying that the history of Pakistan is not part of the history of India. Look at the History of India pg, it has the history of Pakistan in it. "Shared with", in my opinion, means that it is also part of the history of India, as well as Afghanistan. Iran i think is mainly their for cultural reasons. "Shared between" is incorrect because Afghanistan, India, Iran are modern nations. No one is trying to divide history modern borders. Look at the Delhi Sultanate, it is mainly within India, but is included in this article as it is important part of Pakistans history. IP198 00:09, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
I changed the lead to "The history of Pakistan—which for the period preceding the nation's founding in 1947, is also part of the histories of Afghanistan, India, and Iran—traces back to the beginnings of human life in South Asia." I hope this is good enough to end the dispute. IP198 17:48, 26 March 2007 (UTC)
Bravo Gentlemen a very well written article, It was very informative and there wasn't a hint of bias in it which I found pleasantly suprising.
You know what would have been better? If right after Partition, India abandoned the name "India" and took up the name "Bharat" not just as an official local name but as its international name for all countries to use and instead the term "India" should have been used by scholars and historians as a regional label (rather then "South Asia" or "Indian subcontinent" or whatever) with the term "Indian" being used to describe the collective history and heritage of the subcontinent countries of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal. That way, we would avoid this messy confusion. Ha ha. But that's not my main point for this post. I think, deeptrivia, you have to understand that Tombseye's point is that the area of what we call "Pakistan" is a region that has its own unique history which is true if you think about it. Just like South India has its own regional history distinct from other parts of the subcontinent or like northeastern India, the area called Pakistan occupies the bulk of the northwestern parts of the subcontinent, an area that historically served as South Asia's racial, cultural, linguistic, religious and sometimes national crossroads with other countries - in essence, its main gateway to the outside world. Even in pre-Partition histories, historians acknowledge this particular region as the subcontinent's share of the cultural highway that marked the region between the Middle East, Central Asia and South Asia (Xinjiang, Afghanistan, southern Turkistan, Khorasan, northwestern India). The reason we acknowledge this area as a separate history of a nation state is because, simply, it IS a nation state TODAY. The history of Qatar was an interesting fact that you mentioned. This isn't directly related, but if you read the history article for the related recent nation state of the UAE (United Arab Emirates), you'll also find that it mentions pre-colonial Arabian merchant history and the old Phoenician trade, etc as its own despite its nonexistence in that era. Afghan Historian 18:10, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
Also, as a country, it simply is an overlap between an Iranian speaking west and a Indo-Aryan speaking east. The history of the western areas still constitute essential parts of Pakistani history despite holding only 18% of our country's population. Also, that 18% isn't as insignificant as you think. Pashtuns have played a key role in our country's history and development. They were the ones who techinically introduced and entrenched Islamic culture into this region. Afghan kings definitely ruled parts of Punjab along with the frontier and Balochistan in their domains, particularly Ahmed Shah Durrani. Lahore and other parts of the Punjab are of strong significance to Afghanis and their history, despite being linguistically removed from them. There is definitely shared history here. But overall, yes, I agree with you that the region is "overall" (note the emphasis) historically closer to what is now India.
Afghan Historian
18:16, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
I've added a few tags on the article to make readers aware that there's an ongoing discussion related to the content of the article. I hope that we all atleast agree that that there is a discussion. deeptrivia ( talk) 22:32, 13 April 2007 (UTC)
I would like to invite everyone's attention to this edit "rv unilateral tagging". Tags added to make readers aware of a long ongoing discussion were simply removed before any of the discussions were concluded. This was not discussed on the talk page, and not even the editor that had added the tags was informed. deeptrivia ( talk) 03:56, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
Technically, Pakistan was created in just 1947, so its history should start from then or from the Pakistan movement. To lay claim to ancient Indian history as exclusively Pakistani history is patently absurd, but also understandable. Everyone wishes their nation had a past - and a glorious one too. ( Jvalant 09:04, 16 April 2007 (UTC))
Around half or less of the events relevant to Indian history take place in what is now Pakistan. It is as much our history as it is India's. No more no less. Afghan Historian 19:05, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
This is what the Goverment of Pakistan states [10]
“ | Pakistan emerged on the world map on August 14,1947. It has its roots into the remote past. Its establishment was the culmination of the struggle by Muslims of the South-Asian subcontinent for a separate homeland of their own and its foundation was laid when Muhammad bin Qasim subdued Sindh in 711 A.D. as a reprisal against sea pirates that had taken refuge in Raja Dahir's kingdom. | ” |
I think their should be one article for the preIslamic history of the subcontinent, but after 711 the history of the 2 countries is very different. The hero of one is the enemy of the other, and vice versa. IP198 01:40, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
The History of Pakistan, by the same token, gives more importance to to topics like Mehrgarh, the Indo-Greek kingdoms, the Parthians, ..., Ahmad Shah Durrani, Anglo-Afghan Wars. There is plenty of room for both histories, as has been observed countless times above by countless people in countless discussions. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 04:21, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
This article is a justification for Pakistan Theory, an entity that never existed before 1930, rather than History of Pakistan. Only rewrinting it on unbiased terms would be the solution. ~rAGU
Maybe this is the wrong place to bring it up but the indus civilization also had colonies in Turkmenistan so we can bring it up.-- Vmrgrsergr 04:41, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
Deeptrivia, Don't know what your act is dude, but it seems (from the history of this page) you've been repeating the same tired arguments for the last two years. Why don't you go bark up the History of India tree instead? As I have mentioned above, on the History of India page, they observe the following guidelines:
The History of Pakistan, by the same token, gives more importance to to topics like Mehrgarh, the Indo-Greek kingdoms, the Parthians, ..., Ahmad Shah Durrani, Anglo-Afghan Wars, as well at the history of the various republics of Pakistan. There is plenty of room for both histories of India and the region that is now Pakistan. So, my advice is that stop wreaking mischief on this page. If you are obsessed with this issue, bring it up on the Village Pump etc. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 20:36, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
Fowler&fowler, I know I should have expected the use of this kind of language, and silly phrases like "kingdoms that overlapped into India", instead of trying to understand the simple HIST 101 concept that using current-day boundaries for ancient history as simply wrong and academically unacceptable, especially if those borders have no historical/cultural/linguistic basis whatsoever. Anyway, because of these attempts to hide even the fact that this issue is being discussed, I think I would better discuss this elsewhere. deeptrivia ( talk) 20:59, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
My point is simply that this is not the best forum for that discussion. The problems exists for all South Asian national histories. India too didn't exist both as a name and as a polity before a certain time, but the history of events occurring in the region before that time is included in the history of India. I think this discussion belongs to some other forum, perhaps a South Asia-wide forum. I think experienced people like Nichalp, Ragib, Dab, and others should be asked what that best forum might be. Fowler&fowler «Talk» 23:30, 17 June 2007 (UTC)
I thought pakistani punjab was the cradle of the vedic civilization. I am surprised that there is no mention of it at all in the history of pakistan. The Indo-Greeks come suddenly after the Indus Valley Civilization, and there's a gap of a couple of thousand years.
==> Please remove this after reading.
I have page at http://www.travel-culture.com/pakistan/history.shtml which is chronology of Pakistan history with all dates. The Vedas (Ragveda) were written in Indus valley by Aryans and Punjab has no relation to it. Todays so called Punjab is in no way region that was in the past It was all Sindh in those days. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.143.113.212 ( talk) 01:29, 26 September 2007 (UTC)
Please do not remove this section. This is one single most import set of events that defined the future of Pakistan and for the next sixty or so years. This was the turning point when;
All the above elements are present to this day and are likely to continue for the foreseeable future. To say this is not important is to be naive of the underlying mechanics at work. Please read Justice Munir report before making up your mind. Both Urdu and English version are available under external links.
Indeed there are not very many events in the “1000 year” history of Pakistan which are so deserving of study to those interested in the development of the mind set of the Pakistani nation today and the problems it currently faces. Lastly, an event that caused the very first martial law in the history of the country is certainly worth mentioning in the history of a country which had martial laws for much of its life. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Malik07 ( talk • contribs) - 15:01, October 3, 2007