Sahiwalਸਾਹੀਵਾਲ

Sahiwal is a city in central Punjab, Pakistan, and the administrative capital of both Sahiwal District and Sahiwal Division. Founded in 1865 as Montgomery on the Karachi-Lahore railway line, it was renamed Sahiwal in 1967. The 2023 census counted 538,344 people, making it the 19th largest city of Pakistan, and the ancient Indus Valley site of Harappa lies just 24 kilometres to its west.

Where is Sahiwal?

Sahiwal sits in central Punjab, Pakistan, roughly 180 kilometres from Lahore and 100 kilometres from Faisalabad, on the road between Lahore and Multan. It is the capital of Sahiwal District and of Sahiwal Division, at about 152 metres above sea level. The city grew up on the Karachi-Lahore railway line, and its station remains one of its landmarks.

History

The land around Sahiwal is far older than the city. Harappa, one of the great cities of the Indus Valley Civilisation, stands only about 24 kilometres west of modern Sahiwal, and the region later saw every empire that crossed the Punjab, from the Mauryas to the Mughals. The modern city, however, dates to 1865, when a railway station was built at a small village on the Karachi-Lahore line. The new town was named Montgomery after Sir Robert Montgomery, then the lieutenant governor of Punjab, and it replaced Gogera as the capital of the newly created Montgomery district. A municipality followed in 1867.

In 1914 work began on the Lower Bari Doab Canal, which brought canal water to the city and the wider region and turned the surrounding land into some of the most fertile in Punjab. When British India was partitioned in 1947, the Punjab Boundary Commission allocated the Montgomery district to Pakistan on the basis of its Muslim majority. In 1967 the city's colonial name was dropped and Sahiwal was restored, after the Sahi clan of the Kharal Rajputs who are the native inhabitants of the area.

Geography & people

Sahiwal lies in the densely populated plain between the Sutlej and the Ravi rivers. The district's soil is very fertile, and the principal crops are wheat, cotton, tobacco, legumes, potato and oilseeds. The climate is hot and semi-arid: summer temperatures can reach 47 degrees Celsius, winter nights can drop to 5 degrees, and average rainfall is about 685 millimetres, most of it in the summer monsoon.

The 2023 census counted 538,344 people in the city, up from 389,605 in 2017, making Sahiwal the 19th largest city in Pakistan and the 12th in Punjab. Punjabi is the mother tongue of about 93 percent of the urban population, with Urdu at near 6 percent. The famous Sahiwal breed of cattle, one of the finest dairy breeds of the region, takes its name from this district.

Places of interest

The great day trip from Sahiwal is Harappa, the 4,600-year-old Indus Valley city about 24 kilometres to the west, one of the oldest urban centres of South Asia. Inside the city, the railway station is a heritage landmark from the town's founding years, and the Chichawatni forest area offers green relief nearby.

Sahiwal is also a working agricultural city worth seeing for what it makes: cotton goods and lacquered woodwork are manufactured here, and the grain and cotton trade fills its markets. The city hosts the University of Sahiwal, a COMSATS University campus, Sahiwal Medical College and the Quaid-e-Azam College of Engineering and Technology, which give it a lively student population.

Notable people

Sahiwal's notable names include former Test cricketers Mushtaq Ahmed and Manzoor Elahi, the Urdu poet Majeed Amjad, television host Tariq Aziz, folk and Sufi singer Saieen Zahoor, and TV artist Dildar Pervaiz Bhatti. In public life, the city is linked with former federal finance minister Rana Mohammad Hanif Khan and former federal minister Nouraiz Shakoor, and in letters with the journalist Nazir Naji and the Urdu poet Kunwar Mohinder Singh Bedi Sahar.

Getting there

Sahiwal grew around its railway station on the Karachi-Lahore line, and rail remains the classic way to arrive. By road it is about 180 kilometres from Lahore and 100 kilometres from Faisalabad, sitting between Lahore and Multan, and plans have been announced to connect it with the Lahore-Multan motorway. Inside the city, the usual rickshaws, taxis and vans cover short routes.

Today

Today Sahiwal is a fast-growing divisional headquarters of more than half a million people, with a metropolitan corporation running its 52 union councils. Its economy rests on agriculture and agro-industry: cotton ginning and textiles, lacquered woodwork, and the trade in wheat, cotton and potatoes. The universities and medical college keep drawing students from across central Punjab. Since 1998 the city has been twinned with Rochdale in Greater Manchester, England, reflecting the deep links between Sahiwal and the Pakistani diaspora in Britain.