Islamabad


Islamabad is the capital city of Pakistan. It is the country's tenth-most populous city with a population of over 1.1 million, and is federally administered by the Pakistani government as part of the Islamabad Capital Territory. Built as a planned city in the 1960s and established in 1967, it replaced Karachi as Pakistan's national capital. Islamabad is located north of the city of Rawalpindi, with which it forms a metropolitan area of over 5.7 million inhabitants.
The Greek architect Constantinos Apostolou Doxiadis developed Islamabad's master plan, in which he divided it into eight zones; the city comprises administrative, diplomatic enclave, residential areas, educational and industrial sectors, commercial areas, as well as rural and green areas administered by the Islamabad Metropolitan Corporation with support from the Capital Development Authority. Islamabad is known for its parks and forests, including the Margalla Hills National Park and the Shakarparian. It is home to several landmarks, including the country's flagship Faisal Mosque. Other prominent landmarks include the Pakistan Monument and Democracy Square.
Rated as Gamma+ by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network, Islamabad has one of the highest costs of living in Pakistan. The city's populace is dominated by both middle- and upper-middle-class citizens. Islamabad is home to more than twenty universities, including Bahria University, Quaid-e-Azam University, PIEAS, COMSATS University, and NUST. It is also rated as one of the safest cities in Pakistan and has an expansive RFID-enabled surveillance system with almost 2,000 active CCTV cameras.

Toponymy

The name Islamabad means City of Islam. It is derived from two words; Islam and abad. The Arabic word Islam means "submission " as it refers to the religion of Islam, Pakistan's state religion, and the Persian suffix -abad means cultivated place, indicating an inhabited place or city. During the course of early modern period, the name was used in the Mughal era, by the emperor Aurangzeb who named many towns in the Indian subcontinent after it. According to a history book by Muhammad Ismail Zabeeh, teacher and poet Qazi Abdur Rehman Amritsari proposed the name of the city.
Occasionally in writing, Islamabad is colloquially abbreviated ISB. Such usage originated in SMS language, in part due to the IATA location identifier for the Islamabad International Airport.

History

Early history

, located on the Pothohar Plateau of the northern Punjab region, is considered one of the earliest sites of human settlement in Asia. Some of the earliest Stone Age artefacts in the world have been found on the plateau, dating from 100,000 to 500,000 years ago. Rudimentary stones recovered from the terraces of the Soan River testify to the endeavours of early man in the inter-glacial period. Items of pottery and utensils dating back to prehistory have been found.
Excavations by Dr. Abdul Ghafoor Lone reveal evidence of a prehistoric culture in the area. Relics and human skulls have been found dating back to 5000 BCE that indicate the region was home to Neolithic peoples who settled on the banks of the Soan and who later developed small communities in the region around 3000 BCE.
The Indus Valley civilisation flourished in the region between the 23rd and 18th centuries BCE. Later the area was an early settlement of the Aryan community which migrated into the region from Central Asia. Many great armies such as those of Zahiruddin Babur, Genghis Khan, Timur and Ahmad Shah Durrani crossed the region during their invasions of the Indian subcontinent. In 2015–16, the Federal Department of Archaeology and Museums, with the financial support of National Fund for Cultural Heritage, carried out initial archaeological excavations and unearthed the remains of a Buddhist stupa at Ban Faqiran, near the Shah Allah Ditta caves. The stupa was dated to between the 2nd and 4th centuries CE.

Construction and development

When Pakistan gained independence in 1947, the southern port city of Karachi was its provisional national capital. In 1958, a commission was constituted to select a suitable site near Rawalpindi for the national capital with particular emphasis on location, climate, logistics, and defence requirements, along with other attributes. After extensive study, research, and a thorough review of potential sites, the commission recommended the area northeast of Rawalpindi in 1959 which was used as provisional capital from that year on. In the 1960s, Islamabad was constructed as a forward capital for several reasons. Karachi was also located at the southern end of the country along the Arabian Sea. Pakistan needed a capital that was easily accessible from all parts of the country. Karachi, a business centre, was also considered unsuitable partly because of intervention of business interests in government affairs. The newly selected location of Islamabad was closer to the army headquarters in Rawalpindi and the Pakistani-administered sectors of the disputed Kashmir in the north.
A Greek firm of architects, led by Konstantinos Apostolos Doxiadis, designed the master plan of the city based on a grid plan which was triangular in shape with its apex towards the Margalla Hills. Islamabad was touted by Pakistani legislators as their counterpart to Chandigarh, whose modernism they envied and with which it shares conceptual similarities. The capital was not moved directly from Karachi to Islamabad; it was first shifted temporarily to Rawalpindi in the early 1960s and then to Islamabad when essential development work was completed in 1966. In 1981, Islamabad separated from Punjab province to form Capital Territory. Such world-renowned architects as Edward Durell Stone and Gio Ponti have been associated with the city's development.

Recent history

Islamabad has attracted people from all over Pakistan, making it one of the most cosmopolitan and urbanised cities of Pakistan. As the capital city it has hosted numerous important meetings, such as the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation summit in 2004.
The city suffered damage from the 2005 Kashmir earthquake which had a magnitude of 7.6. Islamabad has experienced a series of terrorist incidents including the July 2007 Siege of Lal Masjid, the June 2008 Danish embassy bombing, and the September 2008 Marriott bombing. In 2011, four terrorist incidents occurred in the city, killing four people, including the murder of the Punjab Governor Salmaan Taseer.
Construction of the Rawalpindi-Islamabad Metrobus, the region's first mass transit line, began in February 2014 and was completed in March 2015. The Rawalpindi Development Authority built the project at a cost of approximately Rs. 24 billion, which was shared by both the Federal government and the provincial government of Punjab.

Geography

Islamabad lies about above sea level at the northern edge of the Pothohar Plateau and at the foot of the Margalla Hills in Islamabad Capital Territory. The modern capital and the ancient Gakhar city of Rawalpindi form a conurbation and are commonly referred to as the Twin Cities.
To the northeast of the city lies the colonial era hill station of Murree, and to the north lies the Haripur District of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Kahuta lies on the southeast, Taxila, Wah Cantt, and Attock District to the northwest, Gujar Khan, Rawat, and Mandrah on the southeast, and the metropolis of Rawalpindi to the south and southwest. Islamabad is located southwest of Muzaffarabad, east of Peshawar and northwest of Lahore.
Islamabad covers an area of. A further area is known as the Specified Area, with the Margala Hills in the north and northeast. The southern portion of the city is an undulating plain. It is drained by the Kurang River, on which the Rawal Dam is located.

Climate

Islamabad has a humid subtropical climate, with five seasons: Winter, Spring, Summer, Rainy Monsoon and Autumn. The hottest month is June, where average highs routinely exceed. The wettest month is July, with heavy rainfalls and evening thunderstorms with the possibility of cloudburst and flooding. The coolest month is January.
Islamabad's micro-climate is regulated by three artificial reservoirs: Rawal, Simli, and Khanpur Dam. The latter is located on the Haro River near the town of Khanpur, about from Islamabad. Simli Dam is north of Islamabad. of the city consists of Margalla Hills National Park. Loi Bher Forest is situated along the Islamabad Highway, covering an area of. The highest monthly rainfall of was recorded during July 1995. Winters generally feature dense fog in the mornings and sunny afternoons. In the city, temperatures stay mild, with snowfall over the higher-elevation points on nearby hill stations, notably Murree and Nathia Gali. The temperatures range from in January to in June. The highest recorded temperature was on 23 June 2005 while the lowest temperature was on 17 January 1967. Light snowfall sometimes happens on the peaks of the hills visible from the city, though this is rare. Snowfall does not occur in the city itself. On 23 July 2001, Islamabad received a record-breaking of rainfall in just 10 hours. It was the heaviest rainfall in Islamabad in the past 100 years and the highest rainfall in 24 hours as well. Water supply is strained, leading to project proposals like the Ghazi Barotha water supply project.

Cityscape

Civil administration

The Islamabad Capital Territory Administration, generally known as ICT Administration, is the civil administration as well as main law and order agency of the federal capital.
The local government authority of the city is the Islamabad Metropolitan Corporation with some help from Capital Development Authority, which oversees the planning, development, construction, and administration of the city. Islamabad Capital Territory is divided into eight zones: Administrative Zone, Commercial District, Educational Sector, Industrial Sector, Diplomatic Enclave, Residential Areas, Rural Areas and Green Area. Islamabad city is divided into five major zones: Zone I, Zone II, Zone III, Zone IV, and Zone V. Out of these, Zone IV is the largest in area. Zone I consists mainly of all the developed residential sectors while Zone II consists of the under-developed residential sectors. Each residential sector is identified by a letter of the alphabet and a number, and covers an area of approximately 2 km × 2 km. The sectors are lettered from A to I, and each sector is divided into four numbered sub-sectors.