Kabirwala

Kabirwala is in Punjab, Pakistan. Its geographical coordinates are 30°20'10" North, 70°43'30" East. It is one of four tehsils in Khanewal District. Kabirwala lies 10 km north of the district capital Khanewal on the Multan-Jhang road. Kabirwala is a city north 40 km from Multan City.

The city is named Kabirwala after [Hazrat] Baba Pir Kabir[3], who lived in the area. Kabirwala was part of Multan until restructuring made the largest sub division of Khanewal district. Sirai Sidhu, a historic city, used to be the tehsil headquarters of the whole district Khanewal, before 1937. During British rule, Kabirwala was the northernmost tehsil of Multan District, Punjab - the boundaries were larger than today lying between 30°5' and 30°45'N. and 71°35' and 72°36' E., with an area of 1,603 square miles (4,150 km²). The population in 1901 was 130,507 compared with 113,412 in 1891. It then contained the town of Tulamba (population in 1901 - 2526) and 320 villages, including Kabirwala, the headquarters. The land revenue and cesses in 1913-4 amounted to 520,000. The Ravi runs through the northern portion of the tehsil to its junction with the Chenab in the north-west corner. The north and west portions were irrigated by the Sidhnai Canal, while the south consisted of uncultivated Bar Jungle.

During the period of British rule it existed as a sub-division of the Multan district and had an annual revenue of over half a million Rupees.

The Kabirwala area is a land of diverse religions and culture. Along with the tombs of Muslim Sufi saints, there are also Hindu places of worship. The Kabirwala city being the seat of Hazrat baba pir Kabir,[3] the historic tomb of Hazrat Khalid Walid, in Mauza Khati Chore along Multan - Sarai Sidhu Road, 24 km to the west of Kabirwala city is located. The tomb of the saint Abdul Hakim is also located in this area in a sub tehsil city of Abdul Hakim.

Kabirwala city is also the seat of the third biggest madrassa (Islamic school) of Deobandi origin, called Darr-ul-aloom Eid Gah Kabirwala. This was established in the 1950s and since its establishment has produced thousands of Islamic scholars, graduates, Muftis and Imams. Religious schools of the Barelvi and Shiiat sects also operate in the city.

Besides being a center for Islamic education, Kabirwala is also has two Hindu Shamshan Ghaats (places of burning the Hindu dead), Ram Chotra and Lachman Chotra, along the bank of Ravi river. There is a Mandir (Hindu temple) in Sarai Sidhu, a sub-town of Kabirwala. Likewise, the Sikh Gurudwara called Pehli Patshahi is located in the Makhdoompur sub-town, 12 km from Kabirwala.

Nestle has chosen Kabirwala as the site for its largest Asian milk processing plant, on the same road, having purchased the Kabirwala Dairy Limited in the 1990s. Reportedly, the plant has a processing capacity of two million liters of milk a day, which is set to rise to three million in the near future. Nestle, through the network of its milk collection centers spread all over the Punjab province, collects milk from 140,000 farmers.

Due to the richness of the natural resources, there have been a number of industrial developments. A large cotton seed oil processing factory, Grace Oil Industries, has been operating since the 1960s near to the village of Allahbad. This was nationalised in the 1970s under Zia's military dictatorship and then privatized again in the 1980s under the name of EFFEF Industries. The first ever cooperative textile factory in the history of Pakistan, Colony Textile Mills, has existed on the edge of Kabirwala area since colonial times. It was located at the Khanewal Road just before entering Khanewal.

Since the discovery of low quality natural gas in the Kukkar Hatta area, which lies near to Kabirawla, there have been attempts to use this resource for fertilizer and energy production. The Fauji industries established Kabirwala Power Plant in the late 1990s near Choperhatta.

These markets are connected by the old Ghalla Mandi (Grain Market) now converted into a food and oil market.

Kabirwala is located at the crossroads of several important routes. It links south with north of Pakistan. All the transport from the Sindh province, Dera Ghazi Khan, Muzaffar Garh, Rahim Yar Khan, Bahawalpur, Multan and Khanewal districts traveling to the capital of Pakistan, Islamabad, has to pass through Kabirwala to connect to Jhang and Sargodha. There are two bus stands, the old one is located at the western edge of the city along the Multan Road, and the new one is located on the southern edge of the city along the Khanewal Road. Apart from the offices of bus companies, these bus stands also house offices of trucking and cargo companies.

The telephone direct dialing code for Kabirwala is (0) 652. There is a telephone exchange in Kabirwala and all of the Pakistan-based Mobile Companies are working in Kabirwala.

• Har Gobind Khorana, the joint winner of the Nobel Prize for Medicine (1968) was born here in 1922.
• Fakhar Imam, was the 11th Speaker of the National Assembly of Pakistan.