Rooted in religion and based on a division of labor, the caste system, among other things, dictates the type of occupations a person can pursue and the social interactions that she may have. Castes are an aspect of Hindu religion. Other religions in India do not follow this system.
The name Pakistan literally means land of the pure in Urdu and Persian. It is a play on the word pÄk meaning pure in Persian and Pashto; the suffix -stÄn is a Persian word meaning place of, cognate with the Sanskrit word sthÄna (Devanagari: à¤¸à¥à¤¥à¤¾à¤¨ [stÌªÊ°aËnÉ]).
Pakistan (/ËpÃ¦káµ»stÃ¦n/ or /pÉËkáµ»ËstÉËn/; Urdu: Ù¾Ø§Ú©Ø³ØªØ§Ùâ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a federal parliamentary republic in South Asia on the crossroads of Central Asia and Western Asia. It is the sixth-most populous country with a population exceeding 200 million people. In terms of area, it is the 33rd-largest country in the world with an area covering 881,913 square kilometres (340,509 square miles).