Mirpuri diaspora

The Mirpuri diaspora constitutes individuals with an origin in the Mirpur District of Azad Kashmir, Pakistan, now living outside that district.[1] Migration from Mirpur started occurring in the 1920s, when many Mirpuris left for Bombay to work on merchant ships.[2] During the partition of British India in 1947, many Mirpuri Hindus and Mirpuri Sikhs were forced to flee to cities in the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir.[3] The construction of the Mangla Dam by the Pakistani Government in the 1960s caused many of Mirpuri Muslims to migrate to the United Kingdom to work as labourers.[2][4]

Mirpuris
میرپوری
Languages
Pahari-Pothwari, Urdu
Religion
Predominately: Islam[1] Minority: Hinduism,[1] Sikhism[1]

India

In the 1920s, some Mirpuris left the area for Bombay, in order to work jobs on the merchant ships of British India.[2]

Just before the partition of India, there were over 114,000 Mirpuri Hindus and Mirpuri Sikhs living in the districts which later became Azad Kashmir.[3] Many of them were engaged in business.[5] After the partition of India, in what is known as the 1947 Mirpur massacre, females belonging to the Hindu and Sikh communities of Mirpur were abducted and raped by Pakistani tribals, with many Hindu Mirpuris and Sikh Mirpuris being forced to flee to Jammu and other parts of India. In total, approximately 20,000 Hindu Mirpuris and Sikh Mirpuris were massacred by Pakistani tribals as they were fleeing, while the remaining number found refuge in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir, where they settled in the cities of Jammu, Kathua, Rajouri, Poonch and Udhampur. By 1951, only 790 Hindu and Sikh Mirpuris remained in their hometown.[3]

Pakistan

In the 1880s colonial India , some Mirpuris migrated to the city of Karachi to work on merchant ships.[6]

Within Pakistan, Azad Kashmiris have migrated towards many provinces outside of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, chiefly Punjab, Sindh (particularly Karachi) and the capital territory of Islamabad.[7][8][9]

United Kingdom
Main article: British Mirpuri

While no accurate statistics are available, an estimated 60 to 70 per cent of British Pakistanis in England trace their origins to the administrative territory of Azad Kashmir in northeastern Pakistan, mainly from the Mirpur, Kotli and Bhimber districts.[10][11][12] Many of these individuals migrated to the United Kingdom in the 1960s to work as labourers after the construction of the Mangla Dam by the Pakistani government flooded agricultural fields.[2][13] The majority of them adhere to the Barelvi movement of Sunni Islam.[4] Large Mirpuri communities can be found in Birmingham, Bradford, Manchester, Leeds, Luton and the surrounding towns.[14][11][15]

References
  1. Harris, Adnan (13 August 2017). "The History of Mirpur as told by Mirpuris and not Wikipedia". Retrieved 27 February 2019. Today, the majority of individuals with roots to erstwhile Mirpur Division actually live in the Diaspora. Britain has the largest Mirpuri community anywhere in the world, and there is also a sizeable Mirpuri community in 'Jammu' originally comprised mostly of Hindu and Sikh refugees. The Mirpuri Mahajan community of Jammu is a particularly affluent community that has contributed massively to all sectors of society; Mirpuris comprise an important professional tier in Jammu which includes prominent Judges and politicians.
  2. Modi, Renu (2009). Beyond Relocation: The Imperative of Sustainable Resettlement. SAGE Publishing. ISBN 9789352802111. Migration from AJK in search of greener pastures dates back to the early 1920s when many people shifted to Bombay for jobs on merchant ships. The second wave of migration was induced by the Mangla dam construction in the 1960s. The difference between the two waves of migration is that while the first one was voluntary, the second one was forced. The construction of the Mangla dam had led to the submergence of vast chunk of fertile land and triggered migration as agro-based activities had collapsed. ... Since the construction work of the dam was with a British company, as per an understanding between the company and the government of Pakistan, 300 displaced persons from Mirpur were given work permits in Britain. After settling in the UK, these people sponsored their relatives living in AJK to immigrate.
  3. Snedden, Christopher (2015). Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris. Oxford University Press. p. 167. ISBN 9781849046213. In Mirpur District and Poonch Jagir, Muslims killed large numbers of Hindus and Sikhs, raped and/or abducted females, or forced non-Muslims to flee either to Hindu-dominant parts of Jammu Province or to India. By 1951, of the former approximately 114,000 non-Muslims who in 1941 had lived in areas that later came to compromise Azad Kashmir--that is, 89 per cent of Mirpur District, 87 percent of Muzaffarabad District and 60 per cent of Poonch Jagir--only a paltry 790 non-Muslims remained.
  4. Bunting, Madeleine (18 July 2005). "Orphans of Islam". The Guardian. Retrieved 27 February 2019.
  5. Duschinski, Haley; Bhan, Mona; Zia, Ather; Mahmood, Cynthia (2018). Resisting Occupation in Kashmir. University of Pennsylvania Press. p. 216. ISBN 9780812249781. Wealthy Hindu merchants known as mahajans who lent money to the community at high interest rates served as a bridge between local citizens and state authorities. In our interview, Justice Abdul Majeed Malik explained that the Mirpuri Hindus still called themselves Mirpuris. He also pointed out that a huge chunk of land in AJK originally belonged to the Hindu families who left AJK in 1947-1948.
  6. Parekh, Bhikhu; Singh, Gurharpal; Vertovec, Steven (2003). Culture and Economy in the Indian Diaspora. Routledge. p. 213. ISBN 9781134490530.
  7. P. Akhtar (9 October 2013). British Muslim Politics: Examining Pakistani Biraderi Networks. Palgrave Macmillan UK. pp. 32–. ISBN 978-1-137-27516-5.
  8. Rehman, Zia Ur (21 July 2016). "Kashmiris in Sindh to vote for two AJK seats today". The News. Retrieved 22 May 2017.
  9. Population Census Organization, Govt. of Pakistan. "MIGRANT POPULATION BY PLACE OF BIRTH" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 13 November 2010.
  10. Balcerowicz, Piotr; Kuszewska, Agnieszka (26 May 2022). Kashmir in India and Pakistan Policies. Taylor & Francis. p. 134. ISBN 978-1-351-06372-2.
  11. Sökefeld, Martin (6 June 2016). "The Kashmiri Diaspora in Britain and the Limits of Political Mobilisation". Migration - Networks - Skills. transcript Verlag. pp. 23–46. doi:10.1515/9783839433645-002. ISBN 978-3-8394-3364-5. Individual migration from what later became AJK started already before the Subcontinent's partition and independence. From the 1950s, chain migration developed, transferring large portions of the population of southern AJK (today's districts of Mirpur, Kotli and Bhimber), resulting in quite concentrated settlements of Kashmiris in Britain, especially in Birmingham, Bradford, different towns in Lancashire and around London.
  12. Kalia, Ravi (11 August 2015). Pakistan's Political Labyrinths: Military, society and terror. Routledge. p. 183. ISBN 978-1-317-40544-3.
  13. Bunting, Madeleine (18 July 2005). "Orphans of Islam". The Guardian. Retrieved 27 February 2019.
  14. Skutsch, Carl (7 November 2013). Encyclopedia of the World's Minorities. Routledge. p. 694. ISBN 978-1-135-19388-1. Kashmiris from Azad Kashmir (the Mirpur and Kotli districts) relocated to Britain in the 1950s, especially to the towns of Bradford, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, and Luton, on account of the availability of unskilled work.
  15. Leiken, Robert (2011). Europe's Angry Muslims: The Revolt of The Second Generation. Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199752621. The same chain migration channels the Mirpuris of Azad Kashmir to places like Bradford or Birmingham's Ward End or Beeston.
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