Are Indians and Pakistanis the same people?

We often do hear Indians and Muhajirs chanting that Indians and Pakistanis are the same people and there's absolutely no difference between the two.
Some go as far to say that the people of the subcontinent are all "exactly the same" divided by political boundaries.

People who normally chant this draw out ignorant statements or try to convince everyone by chanting the same statement over and over again to the point that people stop questioning it.
I want to touch on the most common arguments that have been made in favor of this idea.

Appearance:
This argument is that Indians and Pakistanis are often mistaken for the same by outsiders and that's "proof" of their supposed "common origin." But then again Pakistanis are often lumped up with Arabs and other Middle Eastern peoples. When I moved to North America, people took me for an Arab. Does that make me an Arab? Does it mean Pakistanis have common origins with Arabs?

The same can be stated for Indians. What's more is only a small minority of people living in Northwestern India resemble Pakistanis when it comes to appearance. Other Indians sometimes look like exact opposites of Northern Pakistanis in terms of appearance. Northern Pakistanis are often tall, of fair complexion resembling Europeans while people from other parts of India often show East Asian or Australoid features with dark skin.

Also, there are "Indians" who are actually people who migrated from Pakistan during independence in 1947 and share common genetics, culture, linguistics with the rest of Pakistan, not with their adopted country.

Demographics:
Another common argument is that due to the shared provinces of Punjab and Kashmir, the two populations are "the same."
One problem is that Kashmir is not recognized as an "Indian state" by Pakistan or the United Nations. It is currently disputed territory and often seen as the fifth province of Pakistan. Only India sees Kashmir as an Indian state.

Neither do the people belong to the common North Indian haplogroup of R2 and it's possible subclades.
In fact Kashmiris are amongst the highest carriers of R1A in Asia, lumping them closer to Eastern European populations than Indian ones.

The other problem is that it is only Punjab that is split between India and Pakistan. The other provinces and populations are not shared by India and Pakistan. Even the populations in these unshared provinces between the two countries are completely distinct.

The major ethnic groups Balochis, Pakhtuns, Sindhis, Kashmiris and other populations of Pakistan are completely different from Indian populations and are not found in India except for some who migrated.
Pakistan also shares some of these mentioned ethnicities with Iran and Afghanistan, yet few have argued in favor of lumping Iran or Afghanistan with Pakistan.

Likewise the many dozens of ethnic groups from Tamils, Bengalis, Rajesthanis, Orissans, Telagu, Kannadas and many others are not found in Pakistan.

Even the various populations of India have little in common with one another.
India itself is so diverse that even the existence of a single "Indian" culture, language or people is not there. India can be compared to the former USSR, while Pakistan can be better compared to Yugoslavia or Switzerland, a home of various distinct, but related cultures and peoples.

Linguistics:
Some shared languages between the two countries especially Hindustani (mostly today called Hindi and Urdu) which is the lingua franca of the subcontinent is used as a basis to argue the "oneness" of Indians and Pakistanis.

Many countries share common languages for various reasons. The Hindustani language developed due to Mughal rulers of the subcontinent who were neither Indian nor Pakistani by origin.
Other shared languages such as Sindhi are due to migration between the two countries.

English is another language often used as a language of business in the two countries and also a legacy of British rule. Does this make the two peoples "one?"
Iran and Iraq have shared languages and demographics of Kurdish, Arab and Turkic populations. No one bothers to term them "one."

Most languages spoken in India are not spoken or understood in Pakistan and vice versa. Most of Pakistan's languages except for Brahui, Burusho and Baltistani are of Indo-European origins.

India's languages on the other hand are around seventy percent Indo-European and the other thirty percent being Dravidian, Sino-Tibetan, Austro-Asiatic and some other language isolates.

Genetics:
This is probably the strongest argument debunking Pan-South Asian propaganda. Most often, cheerleaders of Indo-Pakistani 'commonality' do not wish to back up their claims with evidence and will rely only on repeating their statements to win agreement.

If one is to search the distributions of haplogroups in the two countries, there is little in common. Even the common Indo-European haplogroup R found in Pakistanis and Northwestern Indians breaks into haplogroup R1A and R2 (sometimes also refereed to as R1B2).
This places Pakistani populations; especially Northern Pakistanis into closer genetic lineages with Eastern European populations than to Indian ones.

Also knowing the fair appearance of Northern Pakistanis and their Indo-European languages, this should hardly be surprising. But even still, it does not make them "the same" as East Europeans, because comparing the two in the 21st century based on ancient links is absurd.

So if they cannot be compared to those people, why would the diverse Indians, most of which are not related be compared to them?

It is also not just the differing distributions of haplogroup R but also various other haplogroups common to India but not to Pakistan. Most Indian haplogroups are not even found in Pakistan.

The haplogroup maps below give us a brief insight: (click to enlarge)






Though the videos below are not exactly accurate in genetics and wrongly calls Indo-Iranic "Indo-Iranian" as well as using the pseudo-anthropological word "desi" and also incorrectly referring to India as "Hindustan," they are still mostly factual and detailed otherwise:

The "Muhajirs" in Pakistan and their diverse backgrounds.

Many in Pakistan think of Urdu-speaking people originally from the state of Utter Pradesh in present-day North India when they think of Muhajirs.

Actually what most people might not know is that the state of Utter Pradesh was manufactured by the British in the 1930s.
What most people also do not know is that most "Muhajirs" are not a common ethnicity but various peoples from different parts of the subcontinent. The only common trait they have is the common Hindustani language which is no the Lingua Franca of the subcontinent.

This does not mean their natives languages were Lashkari ('Urdu') or whatever you may call it.
I have met "Muhajirs" who trace their roots back to Bengal, South India and other part of the subcontinent. Most of them don't even know a word of Bengali or other languages of their parents.

I even met a person at a hospital who claimed he had a Tamil Muslim friend who's family migrated to Pakistan.
Even in her book Empires of the Indus, the British author Alice Albina writes that during independence, some forty four thousand immigrants from all over India migrated to Pakistan.

This information can be found in her book on page sixteen paragraph two. "Some forty four thousand Muslims government employees- tea boys and peons, civil servants and politicians; and their spouses, parents and children- took the train from all over India and came to Pakistan. Naturally, they hollered for housing, they camped in Karachi's school, they filled up its lovely green spaces with their clamorous existence."

Imagine these immigrants and their descendants now. Their numbers must have increased dramatically to millions knowing Karachi's massive population. To know the history of the "Muhajirs" and their presence in Pakistan, each ethnicity of a Muhajir family and their background must be investigated.

For decades "Muhajirs" have been lumped as a whole on the basis of a common first language they speak today. The purpose of this post is to show that is clearly not the case and that "Muhajirs" are from various backgrounds, both Indian and Non-Indian alike.

Where and what is Hindustan?

Many modern-day people seem to think of Hindustan as a synonym for the country India. This is an incorrect understanding of the word and the history behind it. Even the understanding of Hindustan as "land of Hindus" is a misconception.

Other people think of this as a regional term for the whole subcontinent. According to geographers and historians, the region of Hindustan covers the Ganges valley in Northern India and the Punjab and Sindh regions of Eastern Pakistan. It also includes Rajesthan and the Delhi region and perhaps parts of China which touches points of the Indus river.
It does not refer to the entire subcontinent, let alone all of India.

According to my knowledge, the word was used by the Mughals for the territories they controlled in South Asia, which was mostly North India, North Eastern Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The word Hindustan most likely has it's roots in Hind, which in term is a corruption of the word Sindh, from the Sanskrit Sindhu which came from "Sapta Sindhu" meaning "land of the rivers."

Sapta Sindhu or the land of the rivers included the river-covered areas of eastern Pakistan and northwestern India.
The Persians who frequently visited the subcontinent through out the centuries, referred to the region as "Hind." This word was most likely a synonym for Sindhu.

For those who do not know, the Mughals were a mostly Persian-led empire with an army of Turko-Mongols. But this army was one of many Persian armies that visited South Asia going back centuries before the common era.

If Hind had the same meaning behind Sindh, then being a Persian led force, the Mughals continued to use the word Hind to refer to the region of rivers in South Asia as their ancestors did, which was mostly the Ganges Valley in Northern India and the Indus Valley in central and eastern Pakistan.

If these theories are correct, it coincides with the original marking of Hindustan which cuts through North India and North Eastern Pakistan. The Mughal word Hindustan could very well be a continuation of the word Hind.

Below is the map of the territories controlled by the Mughal Empire:


Another misconception is that Hindustan had a religious meaning. This is not true at all. As already known to many, the reference to "Hindu" and "Hinduism" as a collective religion did not exist until the arrival of the British who termed all the indigenous religions of South Asia as "one."

If Hind had the same meaning as "Sindh" then Hindustan would also mean "land of the rivers" which makes sense, since the area of Punjab and the Ganges valley was rules by the Mughals.
Sindh was not under Mughal rule as far as any sources state , nor do any maps show most of Pakistan being under Mughal rule.

Conclusively, the correct meaning of Hindustan is the region that cuts through Northern India and North Eastern Pakistan. It does NOT refer to India as a whole or even the subcontinent.
Nor does it refer to all of Pakistan.

Hindustan is historically a geographic term despite the fact that is has been politicized now. Even Hind and "Hindu" had no religious meaning until the British labeled the various pagan cults of South Asia as such into one "Hinduism."

A basic map of Hindustan which includes areas of Southern China:

The Aryans of Pakistan

Many Pakistani history writers when discussing the pre-history of Pakistan, mention the Aryans as just one of the invaders alongside the Persians, the Greeks or the Mongols etc.

What they don't realize is that the situation of the Aryans was very different than that of the Persians, Arabs or others, for the Aryans are the ancestors of most modern-day Pakistanis, most likely alongside the native peoples of the Indus Valley.

As mentioned in another post of mine, Aryan does not necessarily mean a white-skinned person, but rather a person of wise or noble descent.
The word has it's roots in the Sanskrit word Aryaa meaning wise or noble.

Though I'm not entirely sure, I was reading on a forum that the literal meaning of Aarya was one who is ahead; hence more advanced.
This theory makes sense to me, as I've found words in Indo-European languages which contain the sound "A" at the beginning of words which indicate a forward direction.

For example the Urdu word for front "aagay" or words in English such as 'ahead' "again" (again indicating repeated cycles).
Even the word heir (pronounced Aa-yer) meaning a successor might be connected to "Aryan" or "Aarya," maybe having it's roots in an expression of after or beyond.

Though it's not a proven fact, it's a strong theory. Already the connection between most Pakistani and European languages is proven, thus pointing to the fact that most Pakistanis and Europeans do have common ancestry at least on Y-Chromosome lines:
We are the Aryans of Pakistan.

Most particularly this refers to those of Sindhi and Punjabi descent. The Aryans were the Sanskrit speakers who migrated from the Eurasian steppes along the Black Sea and later merged with the indigenous people of the Indus Valley. From their Sanskrit language came the modern languages of Punjabi, Sindhi, Urdu and other Indo-Aryan languages. About five centuries later they were followed by their distant relatives, the Iranic peoples.

Their descents are mainly the Pakhtuns and the Baloch. All languages derived from Vedic Sanskrit are Indo-Aryan languages and those who descend from the Vedic Aryans are the modern Indo-Aryans.
The descendants of the early Iranic peoples who came to Pakistan are mainly the Pakhtuns and the Baloch and their languages belong to the Iranic sect of Indo-Iranic.

Click on the linguistic chart below to enlarge:


The Dardic people of Northern Pakistan are also derived from Proto-Indo-Aryans however their isolated position in the mountains has allowed them to evolve differently from Punjabis, Sindhis and other Indo-Aryan populations in Pakistan.

Genetically, the people of the Kashmir Valley and Northern Areas are closer to Eastern Europeans given they stayed in isolation and did not mix as much with indigenous races. Such isolation also allowed their languages to evolve more distinct from other Indo-Aryan languages as well as each others languages which is why they are often given the separate classification of "Dardic."

This name was given to the land by the ancient Greek explorer Herodotus.
The isolation of the Indo-Aryans today known as the Dards has also allowed them to preserve many aspects of their culture, particularly the non-Muslim Kalash population who practice a continuation of the prehistoric Indo-European religion(s).

The Aryans who started arriving around the seventeenth century BC were the most significant invaders, being our ancestors and bringing with them the Sanskrit language which became most of Pakistan's main languages.



The other invaders were not as significant since they did not leave many descendants. If one is to search haplogroup maps on Pakistan, there is not much Semitic, Mediterranean or Turanian markers in the Pakistani population.

Pakistanis are the decedents of the Aryan invaders combined with the native population of the Indus Valley; though it is not clear who the Indus Valley people(s) were.
There might have been other populations passing through, the IVC could have been a multi-ethnic society, but there are too many unsolved mysteries about what Pakistan was like before the Aryan invasion of the region.

Background of Hindi and Urdu (aka Hindui and Lashkari)

The average Hindutva will claim that Hindi is the continuation of the original Hindustani language while Undri or Urdu is a plagiarized form of Hindi, using Perseo-Arabic script and Persian, Arabic plus Turkic vocabulary. Many brainwashed Pakistanis buy into this idea.

Many would think that Hindi having more Sanskrit vocabulary would be closer to the original parent of these two languages, Sanskrit.
Actually, the reality of the matter is far from these beliefs. The original Hindustani language developed as a result of the Mughals trying to learn Sanskrit.

In doing so, many Persian and Turkic words entered the language since the Mughals were a Persian led empire with an army of Turko-Mongols.
It was later on that the Hindustani language was popularly nicknamed "Zaban-i-Ordu" or the language of the royal military camp since the Mughals were the military rulers and spoke Hindustani.

Later on, the nickname "Zaban-i-Ordu" was frequently called "Ordu" (Ordu means army in Turkic languages) for short. This name evolved into the local pronunciation "Urdu."
The reason for "Hindi" (another variant of Hindustani) not having Turkic, Arabic and Persian vocabulary and having more Sanskrit words is because deliberate efforts were made by Hindutva nationalists to remove vocabulary imported by the Muslim invaders.

The Sanskritization of Hindi started in the pre-independence era and continued on after independence of British rule. Not because Hindi is the 'original' variant of Hindustani.
The deliberate Sanskritization of is well documented in news articles, books and other academic publications.

So if the Turkic, Arabic, Persian vocab in Hindi has been removed as a deliberate act and not a result of natural linguistic evolution, can Hindutvas claim the modern Hindi language to be 'closer' to the original Hindustani language or even to Sanskrit?

Since modern Urdu or Undri retains most of the Turkic, Arabic and Persian vocabulary of Hindustani, it has a much higher ground over Hindustani than Hindi does.
An important fact to note is that the percentage of vocabulary from a parent language in the off-spring language is irrelevant in modern linguistics.

Urdu is said to have only about seven percent of it's vocabulary inherited from Sanskrit.
Modern Turkish has more than half of it's vocabulary inherited from Arabic and Persian, and to a lesser extent, Greek.

Despite all this, Turkish is still an Altaic language due to it's distinct structure unrelated to Arabic and Persian/Farsi.
Likewise, Urdu or Undri is an Indo-Aryan language because it's structural base originates from Sanskrit, regardless of it's vocabulary.

The Sanskritization of Hindi has been pushed to such an extreme that many Hindi-speaking Indians don't understand it anymore. That's how different it has become from the original Hindustani language.

This is probably the reason why Urdu/Undri has been selected for use in bollywood, to gain a larger audience, since many Hindi-speaking Indians cannot understand this heavily Sanskritized version of Hindi.
This usage of Urdu/Undri in bollywood has caused an outcry amongst Hindutvas, so the name Hindustani has been adopted to make it sound more neutral.

Another fact to note is that Hindustan and Hindustani do not have any religious meaning. The word "Hindu" used by most Indians today to refer to their 'religion' stems from the word "Hind" used by the Persians and later by the Arabs as well. This word evolves from the Sanskrit words "Sindh" and "Sindhu" meaning "land of the rivers" referring to the Indus Valley region and perhaps the Ganges plain.

It was from this word that the British coined 'Hinduism' to refer to the various pagan cults and religions in the subcontinent mostly unrelated to each other.
The Mughal usage of the words 'Hindustan' and 'Hindustani' has absolutely no religious basis, but geographical ones.

All these facts can easily be researched and based on them, it's fair to state that Urdu/Undri is not derived from modern Hindi, but instead Hindustani which in turn is derived from Sanskrit.

Though Urdu/Undri has evolved through centuries under different names from Hindwi to Hindustani to Urdu and Undri, it is an independent language of Hindi and always has been.

New World Encyclopedia articles about Pakistan

NWE: Pakistan

Religions in Pakistan in the pre and post Islamic era.

Contrary to popular belief, "Hinduism" is not a religion, but many distinct religions stereotyped as a "single religion" by the British.
It's very much like calling the various cults/religions of South America (Aztec, Mayan, Inca) "South Americanism."

Just about every region in the world had various cults/religions. The Middle East was filled with various religions (and still is, though not as much as before) such as Yazidism, Zoroastrianism, Arab paganism, Druze just to name a few.
Likewise, Pakistan and it's surrounding regions were diverse in religions and spirituality.


A Shaman from the Hunza Valley in Northern Pakistan.

Traces of Zoroastrianism, Shamanism, Buddhism, Sufism (now combined with Islam), Indo-Iranic paganism (now survived by the Kalash) can be found.

Even today minorities and Muslims can be found practicing all the mentioned religions/cults and most recently Sikhism, which formed much after the others.


Sikh children in Pakistan.

What is known to few is that the people of Sindh were predominantly Buddhist prior to the Arab conquest led by Muhammad Bin Qasim. There were Brahmins too, whom today identify themselves as "Hindus."
Also contrary to popular belief, Islam was not spread and well established under Arab rule.

The Arab rulers managed to establish a temporary presence in coastal areas of Pakistan and other coastal parts of the subcontinent including nearly all of Sindh.
Some coastal areas of India may also have been exposed to Islam since Arab traders have been sailing to the Indian peninsula for centuries due to trade and commerce.

But the real establishment of Islam occurred with the conquest of Turkic empires starting with the Ghaznavids as they are the first recorded Islamic empire to invade from Central Asia. It all ended with the Mughals who were the last Muslim empire in South Asia.


A Buddhist artifact from Gandhara. Buddhism gained strength in Pakistan during Mauryan rule and during the Greco-Bactrian establishment.

But never in the history of Pakistan or humanity was there ever a religion called "Hinduism."
No ancient text weather Sanskrit, ancient Persian, ancient Greek or other mentions such a religion.
The Arabs noted at least 42 distinct cults/religions in their writings from sun worshipers to snake and idol worshipers.

A brief insight into the history and origins of so-called "Hinduism" can be found here.

The religion of the Indus Valley Civilization is yet to be known considering weather they even had a single religion or any religion at all.

Traces of Greek paganism can also be found due to Greek rule of Pakistan starting around the third century BC. Monuments and artifacts of their mythology can be found in North Western Pakistan especially Gandhara and Taxila.
However, no followers of Greek paganism can be found in Pakistan today.

A Greek bust from the Greek Kingdom in Northern Pakistan.