Hyderabad

HYDERABAD is 164 km north of Karachi the second largest city in Sindh and 5th largest in Pakistan. Hyderab ad was capital of Sindhh between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Founded in 1768 on the site of the ancient town of Nirun-Kot by Ghulam Shah Kalhora, Hyderabad was laid out by his son,Sarfaraz Khan, in 1782 and was the capital of the emirs of Sindh. The British East India Company occupied Hyderabad when the Sindh became a British protectorate in 1839. From 1947 to 1955 Hyderabad was the capital of Sindh Province.Hyderabad was incorporated as a municipality in 1853.Today newly developed settlements and industrial estates surround the congested old city area.In the old city, buildings are topped by badgirs ("wind-atchers") that look like chimneys on roof tops.They catch the cool breezes which blow steadily in a south-west direction for 40 days from late April each year. Hyderabad is hot for most of the year,although in autumn and winter the temperature dips down to around 24 C . In the old sections of the town, cows still roam the streets giving it a distinctly medieval atmo.