British Pakistanis Help to Change Kashmir Skyline

The skyline of Mirpur, in Pakistani-controlled Kashmir, once boasted nothing more than two-storey brick houses and mud huts. All that has changed since British Pakistanis returned to invest money earned in the UK in their ancestral town. Now soaring doric columns jostle with gilded porticos at the entrances of huge houses. A construction boom fuelled by money from Britain is transforming what was once one of Pakistan’s poorest towns into its “Beverly Hills”. The result is the region’s most spectacular mix of architectural styles since the British Raj introduced “disappointed gothic” to the subcontinent. Noor Hussein spent 25 years in Birmingham working as a taxi-driver but is now a Mirpur estate agent.