Kashmir

A state in the far northwest of India, bordered on the west by Pakistan, on the north and east by (Chinese-controlled) Tibet, and on the south by the state of Punjab. Much of Kashmir is disputed territory: the border with Pakistan is a de facto line-of-control, not an agreed-upon border. Kashmir includes the mountainous region called Ladakh, once a Tibetan-ruled territory, through which the Indus River flows toward Pakistan; the fertile and temperate-climate Himalayan foothills, including the Srinagar Valley; and an area to the south in the plains where the Kashmiri winter capital, Jammu, is located. The majority of the population is Muslim, but at Partition and Independence in 1947, the ruler of Kashmir, who was Hindu, opted to have Kashmir become part of India rather than to join Pakistan.