Attock (formerly Campbellpur) is a city located in the northern border of the Punjab

Punjab (Pakistan)

Punjab is the most populous province of Pakistan, with approximately 45% of the country's total population. Forming most of the Punjab region, the province is bordered by Kashmir to the north-east, the Indian states of Punjab and Rajasthan to the east, the Pakistani province of Sindh to the...

 province of Pakistan

Pakistan

Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a sovereign state in South Asia. It has a coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and China in the far northeast. In the north, Tajikistan...

 and the headquarters of Attock District

Attock District

Attock District is a district in the north-west Punjab Province of Pakistan.The district was created in April 1904 by the merger of Talagang Tehsil in the Jhelum District with the Pindigheb, Fatehjang and Attock tehsils from Rawalpindi District of the Punjab province of British India.Attock...

. In the 1901 census, Attock was reported to have had a population of 2866 people, a figure which has grown dramatically during the 20th century with 69,588 reported in the 1998 census and contemporary estimates approaching 100,000.

It is located on the bank of the Indus, just 80 km (50 mi) from Rawalpindi

Rawalpindi

Rawalpindi , locally known as Pindi, is a city in the Pothohar region of Pakistan near Pakistan's capital city of Islamabad, in the province of Punjab. Rawalpindi is the fourth largest city in Pakistan after Karachi, Lahore and Faisalabad...

, 100 km (62 mi) from Peshawar

Peshawar

Peshawar is the capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and the administrative center and central economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan....

, and 10 km (6 mi) from the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex

Pakistan Aeronautical Complex

The Pakistan Aeronautical Complex is a facility used to service, assemble and manufacture aircraft for the Pakistani Armed Forces...

, Kamra

Kamra

Kamra is located in Attock District in the mountainous north of the Punjab, Pakistan. The Pakistan Aeronautical Complex and PAF's Minhas Airbase are located in Kamra. It is the biggest air force base in whole of Pakistan...

.

History

Gandhara was a historic region of ancient India (which corresponds to areas of north west Pakistan including Attock). Situated astride the middle Indus River, the region had Taxila

Taxila

Taxila is a Tehsil in the Rawalpindi District of Punjab province of Pakistan. It is an important archaeological site.Taxila is situated about northwest of Islamabad Capital Territory and Rawalpindi in Panjab; just off the Grand Trunk Road...

 and Peshawar

Peshawar

Peshawar is the capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and the administrative center and central economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan....

 as its chief cities. It was originally a province of the Persian Empire and was reached (327 B.C.) by Alexander the Great. The region passed to Chandragupta

Chandragupta

Chandragupta may refer to:* Chandragupta Maurya, Indian Emperor, Mauryan Empire, 322–293 BCE* Chandragupta I, Indian king, Gupta Empire, 320-335 CE* Chandragupta II, Also known as Chandragupta Vikramaditya. Indian Emperor, Gupta Empire, 375-414 CE...

, founder of the Maurya empire

Maurya Empire

The Maurya Empire was a geographically extensive Iron Age historical power in ancient India, ruled by the Mauryan dynasty from 321 to 185 BC...

, in the late 4th century B.C., and under Asoka was converted (mid-3d cent.) to Buddhism. It was part of Bactria

Bactria

Bactria and also appears in the Zend Avesta as Bukhdi. It is the ancient name of a historical region located between south of the Amu Darya and west of the Indus River...

 from the late 3d cent. to the 1st cent. B.C. Under the Kushan dynasty

Kushan Empire

The Kushan Empire originally formed in the early 1st century AD under Kujula Kadphises in the territories of ancient Bactria on either side of the middle course of the Oxus in what is now northern Afghanistan, Pakistan, and southern Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.During the 1st and early 2nd centuries...

 (1st cent.–3d cent. A.D.), and especially under Kanishka

Kanishka

Kanishka ) was an emperor of the Kushan Empire, ruling an empire extending from Bactria to large parts of northern India in the 2nd century of the common era, and famous for his military, political, and spiritual achievements...

, Gandhara developed a noted school of sculpture, consisting mainly of images of Buddha and relief’s representing scenes from Buddhist texts, but with marked Greco-Roman elements of style. The art form flourished in Gandhara until the 5th century, when the region was conquered by the Huns.

Attock fort was completed in 1583 under the supervision of Khawaja Shamsuddin Khawafi

Khawaja Shamsuddin Khawafi

Khawaja Shamsuddin Khawafi was Emperor Akbar's minister and superintendent of construction.He built the fish pond and the tomb Gurdwara Panja Sahib between 1581 - 1583 AD on orders of Akbar....

, a minister of Emperor Akbar.
In 1759-60, Maratha

Maratha

The Maratha are an Indian caste, predominantly in the state of Maharashtra. The term Marāthā has three related usages: within the Marathi speaking region it describes the dominant Maratha caste; outside Maharashtra it can refer to the entire regional population of Marathi-speaking people;...

 forces had captured the Fortress of Attock.
The Last Sikh Kingdom (1799–1849) under Maharaja Ranjit Singh (1780–1839) Captured Fortress of Attock in 1813 from the Afghan Kingdom (Attock Then Part of Afghanistan). later Maharaja Ranjit Singh Sher-e-Panjab Put Sardar Javala Singh Padhania in charge of the fortress of Attock which he, with a handful of troops, successfully guarded against Afghan onslaughts.

Then in 1849 Attock went to the British Who Created a District Named it Campbellpur District after 1947 The Pakistani Government renamed it as Attock in 1970s.

The city's foundations were laid in 1903, and it was named Campbellpur after Sir Colin Campbell

Colin Campbell, 1st Baron Clyde

Field Marshal Colin Campbell, 1st Baron Clyde GCB, KSI was a British Army officer from Scotland who led the Highland Brigade in the Crimea and was in command of the ‘Thin red line’ at the battle of Balaclava...

. The city was established near Attock fort

Attock Fort

Attock fort was built at Attock Khurd during the reign of Akbar the Great from 1581 to 1583 under the supervision of Khawaja Shamsuddin Khawafi to protect the passage of the Indus....

. That was major routes towards central Asia. The district was created in April 1904 by the merger of Talagang Tehsil in the Jhelum District with the Pindigheb, Fatehjang and Attock tehsils from Rawalpindi District of the Punjab province of British India.

Attock's first oil well was drilled in Khaur

Khaur

Khaur is a town and union council of Pindigheb Tehsil in the Attock District of Punjab. The town is located at 33°14'59N 72°77'19E.Historically, the town of Khaur was the seat of a Chauhan Rajput principality, but by the 19th Century, the Chauhan had declined to merely the ownership of three...

 in 1915. It has an oil and gas field Dakhini near Jand.

Although Pakistan had become independent from Britain in 1947, it wasn't until 1978 that the name Attock was adopted for the city.

During the Partition of Punjab Province of British India Attock District had a Muslim majority with minorities of Hindus and Sikh

Sikh

A Sikh is a follower of Sikhism. It primarily originated in the 15th century in the Punjab region of South Asia. The term "Sikh" has its origin in Sanskrit term शिष्य , meaning "disciple, student" or शिक्ष , meaning "instruction"...

s.