Kashmir 

(IPA: [kaʃmiːr]) is the northernmost geographical region of the Indian subcontinent.

Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only the Kashmir Valley between
the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal Range. Today, the term encompasses a larger area
that includes the Indian-administered territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, the
Pakistani-administered territories of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan, and the Chinese-
administered territories of Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract.[1][2][3]
In 1820 the Sikh Empire, under Ranjit Singh, annexed Kashmir.[4] In 1846, after the Sikh
defeat in the First Anglo-Sikh War, and upon the purchase of the region from
the British under the Treaty of Amritsar, the Raja of Jammu, Gulab Singh, became the new
ruler of Kashmir. The rule of his descendants, under the paramountcy (or tutelage[5][6]) of
the British Crown, lasted until the Partition of India in 1947, when the former princely
state of the British Indian Empire became a disputed territory, now administered by three
countries: India, Pakistan, and China.[1][7][8][2]

History
For a history of the region including the pre-19th century period, see History of
Kashmir, History of Gilgit-Baltistan, and History of Ladakh.
In the first half of the first millennium, the Kashmir region became an important centre
of Hinduism and later of Buddhism. During the 7th-14th centuries, the region was ruled by a
series of Hindu dynasties,[22] and Kashmir Shaivism arose.[23] In 1339, Shah Mir became the
first Muslim ruler of Kashmir, inaugurating the Salatin-i-Kashmir or Shah Mir dynasty.[4] The
region was part of the Mughal Empire from 1586 to 1751,[24] and thereafter, until 1820, of the
Afghan Durrani Empire.[4]
Sikh rule
Map of India in 1823, showing the territories of the Sikh empire (northernmost, in green) including the region
of Kashmir

In 1819, the Kashmir Valley passed from the control of the Durrani Empire of Afghanistan to the

conquering armies of the Sikhs under Ranjit Singh of the Punjab.[25] As the Kashmiris had
suffered under the Afghans, they initially welcomed the new Sikh rulers.[26] However, the Sikh
governors turned out to be hard taskmasters, and Sikh rule was generally considered oppressive.
[27]
 Kashmir had also now begun to attract European visitors, several of whom wrote of the abject
poverty of the vast Muslim peasantry and of the exorbitant taxes under the Sikhs.[26][28] High taxes
forced many Kashmiri peasants to migrate to the plains of the Punjab.[29] Kashmir became the
second highest revenue earner for the Sikh Empire.[30] During this time Kashmir shawls became
known worldwide, attracting many buyers, especially in the West.[30]
The state of Jammu, which had been on the ascendant after the decline of the Mughal Empire,
came under the sway of the Sikhs in 1770. Further in 1808, it was fully conquered by Maharaja
Ranjit Singh. Gulab Singh, then a youngster in the House of Jammu, enrolled in the Sikh troops
and, by distinguishing himself in campaigns, gradually rose in power and influence. In 1822, he
was anointed as the Raja of Jammu.[31] Along with his able general Zorawar Singh Kahluria, he
conquered and subdued Rajouri (1821), Kishtwar (1821), Suru valley
and Kargil (1835), Ladakh (1834–1840), and Baltistan (1840), thereby surrounding the Kashmir
Valley. He became a wealthy and influential noble in the Sikh court.[32]
Princely state
Main article: Jammu and Kashmir (princely state)

1909 Map of the Princely State of Kashmir and Jammu. The names of regions, important cities, rivers, and
mountains are underlined in red.

In 1845, the First Anglo-Sikh War broke out. According to The Imperial Gazetteer of India:
Gulab Singh contrived to hold himself aloof till the battle of Sobraon (1846), when he appeared
as a useful mediator and the trusted advisor of Sir Henry Lawrence. Two treaties were
concluded. By the first the State of Lahore (i.e. West Punjab) handed over to the British, as
equivalent for one crore indemnity, the hill countries between the rivers Beas and Indus; by the
second the British made over to Gulab Singh for 75 lakhs all the hilly or mountainous country
situated to the east of the Indus and the west of the Ravi i.e. the Vale of Kashmir.[25]
Drafted by a treaty and a bill of sale, and constituted between 1820 and 1858, the Princely State
of Kashmir and Jammu (as it was first called) combined disparate regions, religions, and
ethnicities:[33] to the east, Ladakh was ethnically and culturally Tibetan and its inhabitants
practised Buddhism; to the south, Jammu had a mixed population of Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs;
in the heavily populated central Kashmir valley, the population was overwhelmingly Sunni
Muslim, however, there was also a small but influential Hindu minority, the
Kashmiri brahmins or pandits; to the northeast, sparsely populated Baltistan had a population
ethnically related to Ladakh, but which practised Shia Islam; to the north, also sparsely
populated, Gilgit Agency, was an area of diverse, mostly Shiʻa groups; and, to the
west, Punch was Muslim, but of different ethnicity than the Kashmir valley.[33] After the Indian
Rebellion of 1857, in which Kashmir sided with the British, and the subsequent assumption
of direct rule by Great Britain, the princely state of Kashmir came under the suzerainty of
the British Crown.
In the British census of India of 1941, Kashmir registered a Muslim majority population of 77%,
a Hindu population of 20% and a sparse population of Buddhists and Sikhs comprising the
remaining 3%.[34] That same year, Prem Nath Bazaz, a Kashmiri Pandit journalist wrote: "The
poverty of the Muslim masses is appalling. ... Most are landless laborers, working as serfs for
absentee [Hindu] landlords ... Almost the whole brunt of official corruption is borne by the
Muslim masses."[35] Under the Hindu rule, Muslims faced hefty taxation, discrimination in the
legal system and were forced into labor without any wages.[36] Conditions in the princely state
caused a significant migration of people from the Kashmir Valley to Punjab of British India.
[37]
 For almost a century until the census, a small Hindu elite had ruled over a vast and
impoverished Muslim peasantry.[34][38] Driven into docility by chronic indebtedness to landlords
and moneylenders, having no education besides, nor awareness of rights,[34] the Muslim peasants
had no political representation until the 1930s.[38]
1947 and 1948
Further information: Kashmir conflict, Timeline of the Kashmir conflict, 1947 Poonch
Rebellion, Indo-Pakistani War of 1947, 1947 Jammu massacres, and 1947 Mirpur massacre

The prevailing religions by district in the 1901 Census of the Indian Empire

Ranbir Singh's grandson Hari Singh, who had ascended the throne of Kashmir in 1925, was the
reigning monarch in 1947 at the conclusion of British rule of the subcontinent and the
subsequent partition of the British Indian Empire into the newly independent Dominion of
India and the Dominion of Pakistan. According to Burton Stein's History of India,
Kashmir was neither as large nor as old an independent state as Hyderabad; it had been created
rather off-handedly by the British after the first defeat of the Sikhs in 1846, as a reward to a
former official who had sided with the British. The Himalayan kingdom was connected to India
through a district of the Punjab, but its population was 77 per cent Muslim and it shared a
boundary with Pakistan. Hence, it was anticipated that the maharaja would accede to Pakistan
when the British paramountcy ended on 14–15 August. When he hesitated to do this, Pakistan
launched a guerrilla onslaught meant to frighten its ruler into submission. Instead the Maharaja
appealed to Mountbatten[39] for assistance, and the governor-general agreed on the condition that
the ruler accede to India. Indian soldiers entered Kashmir and drove the Pakistani-sponsored
irregulars from all but a small section of the state. The United Nations was then invited to
mediate the quarrel. The UN mission insisted that the opinion of Kashmiris must be ascertained,
while India insisted that no referendum could occur until all of the state had been cleared of
irregulars.[40]
In the last days of 1948, a ceasefire was agreed under UN auspices. However, since
the plebiscite demanded by the UN was never conducted, relations between India and Pakistan
soured,[40] and eventually led to two more wars over Kashmir in 1965 and 1999.
Current status and political divisions
India has control of about half the area of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir,
which comprises Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, while Pakistan controls a third of the region,
divided into two provinces, Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh
are administered by India as union territories. They formed a single State until 5 August 2019,
when the state was bifurcated and its limited autonomy was revoked.[41]
According to Encyclopædia Britannica:
Although there was a clear Muslim majority in Kashmir before the 1947 partition and its
economic, cultural, and geographic contiguity with the Muslim-majority area of the Punjab (in
Pakistan) could be convincingly demonstrated, the political developments during and after the
partition resulted in a division of the region. Pakistan was left with territory that, although
basically Muslim in character, was sparsely populated, relatively inaccessible, and economically
underdeveloped. The largest Muslim group, situated in the Valley of Kashmir and estimated to
number more than half the population of the entire region, lay in Indian-administered territory,
with its former outlets via the Jhelum valley route blocked.[42][1]
The eastern region of the former princely state of Kashmir is also involved in a boundary dispute
that began in the late 19th century and continues into the 21st. Although some boundary
agreements were signed between Great Britain, Afghanistan and Russia over the northern
borders of Kashmir, China never accepted these agreements, and China's official position has not
changed following the communist revolution of 1949 that established the People's Republic of
China. By the mid-1950s the Chinese army had entered the north-east portion of Ladakh.[42]
By 1956–57 they had completed a military road through the Aksai Chin area to provide better
communication between Xinjiang and western Tibet. India's belated discovery of this road led to
border clashes between the two countries that culminated in the Sino-Indian War of October
1962.[42]

A white border painted on a suspended bridge delineates Azad Kashmir from Jammu and Kashmir

The region is divided amongst three countries in a territorial dispute: Pakistan controls the
northwest portion (Northern Areas and Kashmir), India controls the central and southern portion
(Jammu and Kashmir) and Ladakh, and the People's Republic of China controls the northeastern
portion (Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract). India controls the majority of the Siachen
Glacier area, including the Saltoro Ridge passes, whilst Pakistan controls the lower territory just
southwest of the Saltoro Ridge. India controls 101,338 km2 (39,127 sq mi) of the disputed
territory, Pakistan controls 85,846 km2 (33,145 sq mi), and the People's Republic of China
controls the remaining 37,555 km2 (14,500 sq mi).
Jammu and Azad Kashmir lie south and west of the Pir Panjal range, and are under Indian and
Pakistani control respectively. These are populous regions. Gilgit-Baltistan, formerly known as
the Northern Areas, is a group of territories in the extreme north, bordered by the Karakoram, the
western Himalayas, the Pamir, and the Hindu Kush ranges. With its administrative centre in the
town of Gilgit, the Northern Areas cover an area of 72,971 square kilometres (28,174 sq mi) and
have an estimated population approaching 1 million (10 lakhs).
Ladakh is between the Kunlun mountain range in the north and the main Great Himalayas to the
south.[43] Capital towns of the region are Leh and Kargil. It is under Indian administration and was
part of the state of Jammu and Kashmir until 2019. It is one of the most sparsely populated
regions in the area and is mainly inhabited by people of Indo-Aryan and Tibetan descent.[43] Aksai
Chin is a vast high-altitude desert of salt that reaches altitudes up to 5,000 metres (16,000 ft).
Geographically part of the Tibetan Plateau, Aksai Chin is referred to as the Soda Plain. The
region is almost uninhabited, and has no permanent settlements.
Though this regions are in practice administered by their respective claimants, neither India nor
Pakistan has formally recognised the accession of the areas claimed by the other. India claims
those areas, including the area "ceded" to China by Pakistan in the Trans-Karakoram Tract in
1963, are a part of its territory, while Pakistan claims the entire region excluding Aksai Chin and
Trans-Karakoram Tract. The two countries have fought several declared wars over the territory.
The Indo-Pakistani War of 1947 established the rough boundaries of today, with Pakistan
holding roughly one-third of Kashmir, and India one-half, with a dividing line of
control established by the United Nations. The Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 resulted in a
stalemate and a UN-negotiated ceasefire.