Mardan Division

Mardan Division is one of the seven divisions in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. It consists of two districts: Mardan and Swabi. According to the 2017 Pakistani Census, the division had a population of 3,997,667, making it the fourth-most populous division in the province. However, it only spans 3175 km2 of area, which makes it the smallest division by area in the province as well. Mardan, with over 350,000 people, is the division's namesake and most populous city. The division borders Hazara Division, Malakand Division, and Peshawar Division. CNIC code of Mardan Division is 16.

Districts
Districts are the administrative unit one level below divisions in the administrative hierarchy of Pakistan. Mardan Division consists of the following two districts:

History
The area which covers Mardan Division today was carved out of the Peshawar District between the 1931 and 1941 censuses of the British India. The newly demarcated area was a Trans-Indus district designated as the Mardan District. The district comprised two tehsils initially, Mardan Tehsil and Swabi Tehsil, which later evolved to become two districts that forms today's Mardan Division.

This setup continued until One Unit, a geopolitical policy that abolished the provinces making up West Pakistan and consolidated West Pakistan into one province. Following the conclusion of the One Unit policy ended in 1970 and the subsequent reinstatement of the original provincial structure, the divisions that emerged during the policy period remained in the North-West Frontier Province. Thus, the Mardan District was situated within the Peshawar Division.

The area received full-fledged division status between the Pakistani censuses of 1981 and 1998, and during the same time period, Swabi Tehsil was also upgraded, to district status (becoming Swabi District).

In August 2000, the division was abolished along with every other division in the country, but was reinstated (with all the other divisions of Pakistan) eight years later after the elections of 2008.

Geography
Mardan Division has a total area of 3175 km2. The area of the division is split rather evenly across both districts, with Mardan District taking up 51.4% of the area of the division (1632 km2), and Swabi District takes up the remaining 1543 km2.

The division borders the important Indus River to its south and east, and has an abundance of natural beauty.

Surrounding areas
To Mardan Division's north and northwest, you will find Malakand Division, to the division's west and southwest, Peshawar Division can be found. To the southeast of Mardan Division, Rawalpindi Division in the province of Punjab can be found, and Mardan Division borders the Hazara Division to its east.

Demographics
As of the 2017 Census of Pakistan, the division had a population of 3,997,667, out of which there were 2,016,397 males, 1,981,159 females, and 121 people who identified as Transgender; this made the sex ratio of the division 1,018 males for every 1,000 females. The division had 526,077 households, making the average household size of the division 7.60; 715,250 people in the division lived in urban areas, but the vast majority (3,282,427) lived in rural areas, making the urbanization rate of the division 17.89% While geographically it is the smallest division in the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, it is the most densely populated with a population density of 1259.11 /km2, making it the fourth-most populated division in the province.

The largest city in Mardan Division is its namesake, Mardan. Mardan had a population of 358,604 in 2017 and was the second-largest city in the entire province (after Peshawar) at the time. Swabi was the second-largest city in the division, and it had a population of 123,412 and was the eighth-largest city in the province. The next three most-populous cities in the division were Takht-i-Bahi, in the Mardan District, with a population of 80,721, Topi, in the Swabi District, with a population of 52,983, and Tordher, also in the Swabi District, with a population of 41,420. The whole division had seven municipalities in 2017, with five of them being concentrated in the Swabi District.

The division has one cantonment, the Mardan Cantonment, adjacent to the city of Mardan which had a population of 6,871, making up the division's entire military population. This made only 0.17% of the entire population of the division active military personnel (one of the smallest military-civilian ratios in all of Pakistan).

In 1998, the dominant language in the division was Pashto, with over 97% of the population speaking it as their mother tongue.

In 2014 - 2015, Mardan Division had a literacy rate of roughly 51%, below the national average of 60%, and just below the provincial average of 53%.

Climate
The climate of Mardan Division varies depending on where you are in the division. In the western part of the division, towards Mardan District and the city of Mardan, the summers are hot, the winters are mild and dry, and little rainfall falls through the year. Here the climate is classified as a BSh (or a hot semi-arid climate) by the Köppen climate classification. In the eastern part of the division, towards Swabi District and the city of Swabi, the summers are hot and long but the winters are dry and cool. Here the climate is classified as a Cwa (or a humid subtropical climate) by the Köppen classification.