Sindh is a province of Pakistan, located in the southeastern region of the country. It is the third-largest Pakistani province by land area and second-largest by population. It is bounded by the Arabian Sea to the south and borders the provinces of Balochistan to the west and Punjab to the north; in addition to sharing an international border with the Indian states of Gujarat and Rajasthan to the east. Karachi, located along the southern coast, is the capital and largest city. Sindh's landscape consists mostly of alluvial plains flanking the Indus River, the Thar Desert in the eastern portion of the province along the international border with India, and the Kirthar Mountains in the western portion along the provincial border with Balochistan.
The first settled life in South Asia emerged around Sindh and Punjab 9,000 years ago along the Indus River Basin, which gradually developed into the Indus Valley Civilisation. The Aryans migrated from Central Asia after 2000 BCE as the Indus Valley Civilisation gradually declined. Around 1000 BCE, the Indo-Aryan kingdom of Sindhu-Sauvīra emerged in Sindh which lasted until 518 BCE when the Achaemenids captured the region, followed by the Macedonians, the Mauryans, the Indo-Greeks, the Indo-Scythians, the Guptas, and finally the Sasanians in the 3rd century CE. Sindh emerged as an independent kingdom under the Rai dynasty in the 5th century, which was succeeded by the Chach dynasty in the 7th century. The Arabs conquered Sindh in 712 CE under the Umayyad Caliphate and established it as a caliphal province — laying the foundations of the Muslim period in South Asia, which lasted over a millennia.
The Habbari Emirate emerged in the 9th century which nominally pledged allegiance to the Abbasid Caliphate. Between the 11th and the 16th centuries, the Soomra, Samma, and Arghun dynasties ruled Sindh respectively — mostly under the vassalage of the Delhi Sultanate. The Mughal Empire captured Sindh in the late 16th century, and directly ruled it until 1701, when the Kalhora dynasty became the local rulers first under Mughal, and later Afsharid and Durrani, suzerainty. The rule of the Talpur dynasty began in 1783 and lasted until 1846 when the East India Company captured Sindh, with a branch of the dynasty continuing to rule Khairpur under British suzerainty. Initially a division in the Bombay Presidency, Sindh became a separate province in 1936 under the Muslim League's demands raised by Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Following the passing of the Lahore Resolution in 1940, Sindh became the first province to officially endorse the Pakistan Movement, and became part of the Dominion of Pakistan upon its independence in 1947. It was amalgamated into West Pakistan in 1955 until being restored to provincehood, with the inclusion of its historic territories, Khairpur and Karachi, in 1970.
The economy of Sindh is the second-largest in Pakistan; its provincial capital Karachi is the most-populous city in the country as well as its main financial hub. Sindh is home to a large portion of Pakistan's industrial sector and contains two of the country's busiest commercial seaports: Port Qasim and the Port of Karachi. The remainder of Sindh consists of an agriculture-based economy and produces fruits, consumer items and vegetables for other parts of the country.
Sindh is sometimes referred to as the Bāb-ul Islām (), or simply Mehrān (), as it was one of the first regions of the Indian subcontinent to become a part of Islamic world. The province is well known for its distinct culture, which is strongly influenced by Sufism, an important marker of Sindhi identity for both Muslims and Hindus. Sindh is prominent for its history during the Bronze Age under the Indus Valley civilization, and is home to two UNESCO-designated World Heritage Sites: the Makli Necropolis and Mohenjo-daro.
Etymology The Greeks who conquered Sindh in 325 BC under Alexander the Great referred to the Indus River as Indós, hence the modern Indus. The ancient Iranians referred to everything east of the river Indus as hind. The word Sind is a Persian derivative of the Sanskrit term Sindhu, meaning "river," a reference to vast Indus River.
The previous Perso-Arabic spelling Sind () was discontinued in favour of Sindh in 1988 by an amendment passed in the Sindh Assembly.
History
Ancient period
Sindh and surrounding areas contain the ruins of the Indus Valley Civilisation. There are remnants of ancient cities and structures, with a notable example in Sindh being that of Mohenjo-daro. Built around 2500 BCE, it was one of the largest settlements of the ancient Indus Civilisation, with features such as standardized bricks, street grids, and covered sewerage systems. It was one of the world's earliest major cities, contemporaneous with the civilisations of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Minoan Crete, and Caral-Supe. Mohenjo-daro was abandoned in the 19th century BCE as the Indus Valley Civilisation declined, and the site was not rediscovered until the 1920s. Significant excavation has since been conducted at the site of the city, which was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1980. The site is currently threatened by erosion and improper restoration. A gradual drying of the region during the 3rd millennium BC may have been the initial stimulus for its urbanisation.Edwin Bryant (2001). The Quest for the Origins of Vedic Culture. pp. 159–60. Eventually it also reduced the water supply enough to cause the civilisation's demise and to disperse its population to the east.
During the Bronze Age, the territory of Sindh was known as Sindhu-Sauvīra, covering the lower Indus Valley, with its southern border being the Indian Ocean and its northern border being the Pañjāb around Multān. The capital of Sindhu-Sauvīra was named Roruka and Vītabhaya or Vītībhaya, and corresponds to the medieval Arohṛ and the modern-day Rohṛī. The Achaemenids conquered the region in the 6th century BCE and established the satrapy of Hindush. The territory may have corresponded to the area covering the lower and central Indus Basin (present-day Sindh and the southern Punjab in Pakistan).M. A. Dandamaev. "A Political History of the Achaemenid Empire" p 147. BRILL, 1989 Alternatively, some authors consider that Hindush may have been located in the Punjab with its capital at Taxila."Hidus could be the areas of Sindh, or Taxila and West Punjab." in These areas remained under Persian control until the invasion by Alexander.Rafi U. Samad, The Grandeur of Gandhara: The Ancient Civilization of the Swat, Peshawar, Kabul and Indus Valleys. Algora Publishing, 2011, p. 33
Alexander initially appointed a native dynast Sambus in present-day Sindh, but after the latter's rebellion replaced him with his general Peithon as governor. He constructed a harbour at the city of Patala in Sindh. After a war with Seleucus I Nicator, who had succeeded Alexander in Persia, Chandragupta Maurya forced him to cede all territories west of the Indus River in 303 BCE, while gifting him 500 elephants.
Following a century of Mauryan rule, by 180 BC the region had come under the Indo-Greeks, followed by the Indo-Scythians, who ruled from their capital at Minnagara. Later on, Sasanians from the reign of Shapur I claimed control of the Sindh in their inscriptions, calling it as Hind.
By the 5th century, Sasanian control, which in any case was tenuous as apparent from the distinct local coinage, weakened further with local ruler Ranaditya minting his own coins. The native Rai dynasty emerged in Sindh and reigned for a period of 144 years, concurrent with the Huna invasions of northern India. Aror was noted to be the capital. The Chach dynasty succeeded the Rai dynasty.P. 505 The History of India, as Told by Its Own Historians by Henry Miers Elliot, John DowsonNicholas F. Gier, FROM MONGOLS TO MUGHALS: RELIGIOUS VIOLENCE IN INDIA 9TH-18TH CENTURIES, presented at the Pacific Northwest Regional Meeting American Academy of Religion, Gonzaga University, May 2006 . Retrieved 11 December 2006. Most of the information about its existence comes from the Chachnama, a historical account of the dynasty.P. 164 Notes on the religious, moral, and political state of India before the Mahomedan invasion, chiefly founded on the travels of the Chinese Buddhist priest Fai Han in India, AD 399, and on the commentaries of Messrs. Remusat, Klaproth and Burnouf, Lieutenant-Colonel W.H. Sykes by Sykes, Colonel; After the dynasty's fall in 712, its members administered parts of Sindh under the Umayyad wilayat of Sind.
Medieval period After the death of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, the Arab expansion towards the east reached Sindh beyond Persia. The connection between the Sindh and Islam was established by the initial Muslim invasions during the Rashidun Caliphate. The first clash with the Rai kings of Sindh took place in 636 (15 AH) under caliph Umar ibn al-Khattab with the governor of Bahrain, Uthman ibn Abu-al-Aas, dispatching naval expeditions against Thane, Bharuch and Debal. Al-Baladhuri states they were victorious at Debal but does not mention the results of other two raids. However, the Chachnama states that the raiders of Debal were defeated and its governor killed the leader of the raids. These raids were thought to be triggered by a later pirate attack on Umayyad ships. Al-Baladhuri adds that this stopped any more incursions until the reign of Uthman. Al-Hakim ibn Jabalah al-Abdi, who attacked Makran in the year 649, was an early partisan of Ali ibn Abu Talib.MacLean, Derryl N. (1989), Religion and Society in Arab Sind, pp. 126, BRILL, During the caliphate of Ali, a number of Jats of the region (known in Arabic sources as Zuṭṭ) came under the influence of Shi'ismS. A. A. Rizvi, "A socio-intellectual History of Isna Ashari Shi'is in India", Volo. 1, pp. 138, Mar'ifat Publishing House, Canberra (1986). with some participating in the Battle of Camel for Ali. Under the Arab Umayyads (661–750), many Shi'as sought asylum in the region of Sindh, to live in relative peace in the remote area.S. A. N. Rezavi, "The Shia Muslims", in History of Science, Philosophy and Culture in Indian Civilization, Vol. 2, Part. 2: "Religious Movements and Institutions in Medieval India", Chapter 13, Oxford University Press (2006).
In 712, Muhammad ibn al-Qasim defeated the last Chach maharaja Dahir who died fighting at the Battle of Aror, and annexed it to the Umayyad Caliphate. The Habbari dynasty ruled much of Sindh as a semi-independent emirate from 854 to 1024. Beginning with the rule of 'Umar bin Abdul Aziz al-Habbari in 854, the region became semi-independent from the Abbasid Caliphate in 861, while continuing to nominally pledge allegiance to the Abbasid Caliph in Baghdad.P. M. ( Nagendra Kumar Singh), Muslim Kingship in India, Anmol Publications, 1999, , pg 43–45.P. M. ( Derryl N. Maclean), Religion and society in Arab Sindh, Published by Brill, 1989, , pg 140–143. The Habbaris ruled Sindh until they were defeated by Sultan Mahmud Ghaznavi in 1026, who then went on to destroy the old Habbari capital of Mansura, and annex the region to the Ghaznavid Empire, thereby ending the Arab rule in Sindh. Later chroniclers like Ali ibn al-Athir (c. late 12th c.) and Ibn Khaldun (c. late 14th c.) attributed the fall of Habbarids to Mahmud of Ghazni, lending credence to the argument of Hafif being the last Habbarid.