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British Pakistanis

بَرِطانِیہ میں مُقِیم پاکِسْتانِی
Distribution by local authority in the 2011 census.
Total population
United Kingdom: 1,662,286 – 2.5% (2021)  England: 1,570,285 – 2.8% (2021)  Scotland: 72,871 – 1.3% (2022)  Wales: 17,534 – 0.6% (2021) Northern Ireland: 1,596 – 0.08% (2021)
Regions with significant populations
London Birmingham Bradford Manchester Kirklees Luton Slough Oldham
Languages
English (British and Pakistani) · Urdu · Punjabi · Pahari-Pothwari · Pashto · Sindhi · Balochi · Brahui · Kashmiri · Khowar · Shina · Balti · others
Religion
Predominantly Islam (92.6%); minority follows other faiths (1.0%) or are irreligious (1.2%) 2021 census, NI, England and Wales only
Related ethnic groups
British Indians British Asians Pakistanis Pakistani diaspora Mirpuri diaspora Punjabi diaspora Sindhi diaspora Pashtun diaspora

British Pakistanis (Urdu: بَرِطانِیہ میں مُقِیم پاکِسْتانِی; also known as Pakistani British people or Pakistani Britons) are Britons or residents of the United Kingdom whose ancestral roots lie in Pakistan. This includes people born in the UK who are of Pakistani descent, Pakistani-born people who have migrated to the UK and those of Pakistani origin from overseas who migrated to the UK.

The UK is home to the largest Pakistani community in Europe, with the population of British Pakistanis exceeding 1.6 million based on the 2021 Census. British Pakistanis are the second-largest ethnic minority population in the United Kingdom and also make up the second-largest sub-group of British Asians. In addition, they are one of the largest Overseas Pakistani communities, similar in number to the Pakistani diaspora in the UAE.

Due to the historical relations between the two countries, immigration to the UK from the region, which is now Pakistan, began in small numbers in the mid-nineteenth century when parts of what is now Pakistan came under the British India. People from those regions served as soldiers in the British Indian Army and some were deployed to other parts of the British Empire. However, it was following the Second World War and the break-up of the British Empire and the independence of Pakistan that Pakistani immigration to the United Kingdom increased, especially during the 1950s and 1960s. This was made easier as Pakistan was a member of the Commonwealth. Pakistani immigrants helped to solve labour shortages in the British steel, textile and engineering industries. The National Health Service (NHS) recruited doctors from Pakistan in the 1960s.

The British Pakistani population has grown from about 10,000 in 1951 to over 1.6 million in 2021. The vast majority of them live in England, with a sizable number in Scotland and smaller numbers in Wales and Northern Ireland. According to the 2021 Census, Pakistanis in England and Wales numbered 1,587,819 or 2.7% of the population. In Northern Ireland, the equivalent figure was 1,596, representing less than 0.1% of the population. The census in Scotland was delayed for a year and took place in 2022, the equivalent figure was 72,871, representing 1.3% of the population. The majority of British Pakistanis are Muslim; around 93% of those living in England and Wales at the time of the 2021 Census stated their religion was Islam.

Since their settlement, British Pakistanis have had diverse contributions and influences on British society, politics, culture, economy and sport. Whilst social issues include high relative poverty rates among the community according to the 2001 census, progress has been made in other metrics in recent years, with the 2021 Census showing British Pakistanis as having amongst the highest levels of homeownership in England and Wales.

History

Part of a series on
British Pakistanis
History
Category
Demographics
Bradford Pakistani community of London
Languages
Potohari-Pahari Urdu others
Culture
Balti (food) Balti Triangle British Punjabi writers Discrimination
Religion
Islam in England
Notables
List of British Pakistanis English people of Pakistani descent Scottish people of Pakistani descent Welsh people of Pakistani descent Northern Irish people of Pakistani descent
Related topics
Pakistan – United Kingdom relations Britons in Pakistan British Asian 2001 Oldham race riots 2001 Bradford riots British Empire
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Pre-Independence

The earliest period of Asian migration to Britain has not been ascertained. It is known that Romani (Gypsy) groups such as the Romanichal and Kale arrived in the region during the Middle Ages, having originated from what is now North India and Pakistan and traveled westward to Europe via Southwest Asia around 1000 CE, intermingling with local populations over several centuries.

Immigration from what is now Pakistan to the United Kingdom began long before Pakistan's independence in 1947. Muslim immigrants from Kashmir, Punjab, Sindh, the North-West Frontier and Balochistan and other parts of South Asia, arrived in the British Isles as early as the mid-seventeenth century as employees of the East India Company, typically as lashkars and sailors in British port cities. These immigrants were often the first Asians to be seen in British port cities and were initially perceived as indolent due to their reliance on Christian charities. Despite this, some of the early Pakistani immigrants married local white British women because there were few South Asian women in Britain.

During the colonial era, Asians continued coming to Britain as seamen, traders, students, domestic workers, cricketers, political officials and visitors and some of them settled in the region. South Asian seamen sometimes settled after ill- treatment or being abandoned by ship masters.

Many early Pakistanis came to the UK as scholars and studied at major British institutions, before later returning to British India. An example of such a person is Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan. Jinnah came to the UK in 1892 and began an apprenticeship at Graham's Shipping and Trading Company. After completing his apprenticeship, Jinnah joined Lincoln's Inn, where he trained as a barrister. At 19, he became the youngest person from South Asia to be called to the bar in Britain.

British interwar period

Most early Pakistani settlers (then part of the British India Empire) and their families moved from port towns to the Midlands, as Britain declared war on Germany in 1939, many expatriates mainly hailing from the city of Mirpur worked in munitions factories in Birmingham. After the war, most of these early settlers stayed on in the region and took advantage of an increase in the number of jobs. These settlers were later joined by their families.

In 1932, the Indian National Congress survey of 'all Indians outside India' (of which Pakistani regions were then a part) estimated that there were 7,128 Indians in the United Kingdom.

There were 832,500 Muslim Indian soldiers in 1945; most of these recruits were from what is now Pakistan. These soldiers fought alongside the British Army during the First and Second World Wars, particularly in the former during the Western Front and in the latter, during the Battle of France, the North African Campaign and the Burma Campaign. Many contributed to the war effort as skilled labourers, including as assembly-line workers in the aircraft factory at Castle Bromwich, Birmingham, which produced Spitfire fighter aircraft. Most returned to South Asia after their service, although many of these former soldiers returned to Britain in the 1950s and 1960s to fill labour shortages.

Post-Independence

Following the Second World War, the break-up of the British Empire and the independence of Pakistan, Pakistani immigration to the United Kingdom increased, especially during the 1950s and 1960s. Many Pakistanis came to the UK following the turmoil during the partition of India and Pakistani independence. Among them were those who migrated to Pakistan upon displacement from India and then migrated to the UK; thus becoming secondary migrants. Migration was made easier as Pakistan was a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. Employers invited Pakistanis to fill labour shortages which arose in Britain after the Second World War.

As Commonwealth citizens, they were eligible for most British civic rights. They found employment in the textile industries of Lancashire and Yorkshire, manufacturing in the West Midlands and the car production and food processing industries of Luton and Slough. It was common for Pakistani employees to work on night shifts and other less desirable hours.

Many expatriates began emigrating from Pakistan after the completion of the Mangla Dam in Mirpur, Azad Kashmir, in the late-1950s led to the destruction of hundreds of villages. Up to 5,000 people from Mirpur (5% of the displaced) left for Britain, while others were allotted land in neighbouring Punjab or used monetary compensation to resettle elsewhere in Pakistan. The British contractor which had built the dam gave the displaced community legal and financial assistance. Those from unaffected areas of Pakistan, such as the Punjab, also emigrated to the UK to help fill labour shortages. Pakistanis began leaving Pakistan in the 1960s. They worked in the foundries of the English Midlands and a significant number also settled in Southall, West London.

During the 1960s, a considerable number of Pakistanis also arrived from urban areas. Many of them were qualified teachers, doctors and engineers. They had a predisposition to settle in London because of its greater employment opportunities compared to the Midlands or the North of England. Most medical staff from Pakistan were recruited in the 1960s and almost all worked for the National Health Service. At the same time, the number of Pakistanis coming over as workers declined.

In addition, there was a stream of migrants from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). During the 1970s, many East African Asians, most of whom already held British passports because they were brought to Africa by British colonialists, entered the UK from Kenya and Uganda. Idi Amin expelled all Ugandan Asians in 1972 because of his Black supremacist views and the perception that they were responsible for the country's economic stagnation. The Commonwealth Immigrants Act 1962 and Immigration Act 1971 largely restricted any further primary immigration to the UK, although family members of already-settled immigrants were allowed to join their relatives.

The early Pakistani workers who entered the UK came intending to work temporarily and eventually returning home. However, this changed into permanent family immigration after the 1962 Act, as well as socio-economic circumstances and the future of their children, which most families saw lay in Britain.

When the UK experienced deindustrialisation in the 1970s, many British Pakistanis became unemployed. The change from the manufacturing sector to the service sector was difficult for ethnic minorities and working-class White Britons alike; especially for those with little academic education. The Midlands and North of England were areas which were heavily reliant on manufacturing industries and the effects of deindustrialisation continued to be felt in these areas. As a result, increasing numbers of British Pakistanis resorted to self-employment. National statistics from 2004 showed that one in seven British Pakistani men work as taxi drivers or chauffeurs. Whilst social issues include high relative poverty rates (55%) among the community according to the 2001 census, progress has been made in recent years, however British Pakistanis alongside British Bangladeshis are still the most likely ethnicity groups to have the highest rates of poverty. Despite relatively high levels of home ownership, 48 per cent of Pakistani households were classified as in poverty after housing costs in the three-year period to 2022/23. The equivalent figure for child poverty in Pakistani households stood at 58 per cent.

Demographics

British Pakistanis by region and country

Region / Country	2021		2011		2001		1991
	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%
England	1,570,285	2.78%	1,112,282	2.10%	706,539	1.44%	449,646	0.96%
—West Midlands	319,165	5.36%	227,248	4.06%	154,550	2.93%	98,612	1.91%
—North West	303,611	4.09%	189,436	2.69%	116,968	1.74%	77,150	1.15%
—Yorkshire and the Humber	296,437	5.41%	225,892	4.28%	146,330	2.95%	94,820	1.96%
—Greater London	290,549	3.30%	223,797	2.74%	142,749	1.99%	87,816	1.31%
—South East	145,311	1.57%	99,246	1.15%	58,520	0.73%	35,946	0.48%
—East of England	99,452	1.57%	66,270	1.13%	38,790	0.72%	24,713	0.49%
—East Midlands	71,038	1.46%	48,940	1.08%	27,829	0.67%	17,407	0.44%
—North East	27,290	1.03%	19,831	0.76%	14,074	0.56%	9,257	0.36%
—South West	17,432	0.31%	11,622	0.22%	6,729	0.14%	3,925	0.09%
Scotland	72,871	1.34%	49,381	0.93%	31,793	0.63%	21,192	0.42%
Wales	17,534	0.56%	12,229	0.40%	8,287	0.29%	5,717	0.20%
Northern Ireland	1,596	0.08%	1,091	0.06%	668	0.04%	—	—
United Kingdom	1,662,286	2.48%	1,174,602	1.86%	747,285	1.27%	476,555	0.87%

Population

According to the 2021 Census, Pakistanis in England and Wales enumerated 1,587,819 or 2.7% of the population. According to estimates by the Office for National Statistics, the number of people born in Pakistan living in the UK in 2021 was 456,000, which makes it the third most common country of birth in the UK.

The ten local authorities with the largest proportion of people who identified as Pakistani were: Pendle (25.59%), Bradford (25.54%), Slough (21.65%), Luton (18.26%), Blackburn with Darwen (17.79%), Birmingham (17.04%), Redbridge (14.18%), Rochdale (13.64%), Oldham (13.55%) and Hyndburn (13.16%). In Scotland, the highest proportion was in East Renfrewshire at 5.25%; in Wales, the highest concentration was in Newport at 3.01%; and in Northern Ireland, the highest concentration was in Belfast at 0.14%.

The Pakistan government's Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis estimates that 1.26 million Pakistanis eligible for dual nationality live in the UK, constituting well over half of the total number of Pakistanis in Europe. Up to 250,000 Pakistanis come to the UK each year, for work, to visit or other purposes. Likewise, up to 270,000 British citizens travel to Pakistan each year, mainly to visit family. Excluding British citizens of Pakistani descent, the number of individuals living in the UK with a Pakistani passport was estimated at 188,000 in 2017, making Pakistan the eighth most common non-British nationality in the UK.

The majority of British Pakistanis originate from the Azad Kashmir and Punjab regions, with a smaller number from other parts of Pakistan including Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gilgit-Baltistan and Balochistan.

The cities or districts with the largest communities, by Pakistani ethnicity in the England and Wales 2021 census, are as follows: Birmingham (pop. 195,102), Bradford (139,553), Manchester (65,875), Kirklees (54,795), Redbridge (44,000) and Luton (41,143).

Historic

In the 2011 UK Census, 1,174,983 residents classified themselves as ethnically Pakistani (excluding people of mixed ethnicity), regardless of their birthplace; 1,112,212 of them lived in England. This represented an increase of 427,000 over the 747,285 residents recorded in the 2001 UK Census.

Demographer Ceri Peach has estimated the number of British Pakistanis in the 1951 to 1991 censuses. He back-projected the ethnic composition of the 2001 census to the estimated minority populations during previous census years. The results are as follows:

Population distribution

Birthplace/year of arrival of British Pakistanis in England and Wales (2021 census)

At the time of the 2021 Census, the local authorities with the largest proportion of British Pakistanis were Pendle (25.59%), Bradford (25.54%), Slough (21.65%), Luton (18.26%) and Blackburn with Darwen (17.79%). The distribution of people describing their ethnicity as Pakistani in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland was as follows:

London

Greater London has the largest Pakistani community in the United Kingdom. The 2021 Census recorded 290,549 Pakistanis living in London. However, it only forms 3.3% of London's population, which is significantly lower than other British cities. The population is very diverse, with comparable numbers of Punjabis, Pashtuns and Muhajirs, and smaller communities of Sindhis and Balochs. This mix makes the Pakistani community of London more diverse than other UK communities, whereas a high proportion of Pakistani communities in Northern England came from Azad Kashmir.

The largest concentrations are in East London, especially in Redbridge, Waltham Forest, Newham and Barking and Dagenham. Significant communities can also be found in the boroughs of Ealing, Hounslow, and Hillingdon in West London and Merton, Wandsworth and Croydon in South London.