Why Pakistan built Islamabad

Why not Karachi?

At independence Karachi was the natural choice of capital: a big city and a centre of sea and air transport. But according to Doxiadis, it fell short on climate, tradition and buildings, which were too few and not up to a capital’s standards. The port city’s layout could not take on a modern capital’s functions, and an influx of refugees added new problems to old ones.^[1][3]

A commission and a site

President Mohammed Ayub Khan set up a special commission under Major General Yahya Khan, the chief of the general staff, which first met in February 1959. That month Ayub made the Greek planner Constantinos Doxiadis its adviser. Two areas were proposed: one outside Karachi and one north of Rawalpindi.^[1]

Ayub chose the site north of Rawalpindi, on the Potwar Plateau, and announced it in June 1959.^[1] Rawalpindi, 14 km away, would serve as the interim capital.^[2] Doxiadis argued that its airport at Chaklala, the Rawal dam’s water and existing road and rail links would save money in the first years of building.^[1]

Naming and planning the city

On 24 February 1960 the president and cabinet named the new capital Islamabad, “the City of Islam”; Doxiadis wrote that the capital could be considered born that day.^[1] Britannica says the name was chosen to reflect the country’s ideology.^[2]

The preliminary master plan was approved on 24 May 1960. It laid a grid of highways across the valleys and planned the metropolitan area for about 2.5 million people within two generations. A new Capital Development Authority took over the job of building it.^[1] Construction began in 1961, with architects including Edward Durell Stone and Gio Ponti working alongside Doxiadis.^[2]

The city was divided into zones: administrative, diplomatic, residential, institutional, industrial, commercial, a greenbelt and a national park, below the Margalla Hills. The war with India in 1971 slowed building for a time.^[2]

“It can be considered that the New capital of Pakistan was born on this day.”^[1]