a Muslimcountry in Asia, west of India and east of Afghanistan and Iran. Population: 193,238,868 (2014). Capital: Islamabad. Pakistan was formed as a new, independent country in 1947, when the British left India and India was divided into separate parts in a process known as ‘Partition’: a mainly Hindu part, the country now called India, and a mainly Muslim part, called Pakistan. Pakistan was also divided into East Pakistan and West Pakistan, but they separated in 1971, when East Pakistan became the new country of Bangladesh, and after this West Pakistan was just called Pakistan. A lot of people from Pakistan came to live in the UK, especially in the 1960s and 1970s. → see alsoBhutto, Benazir, Jinnah, Mohammed Ali