Prior to the partition of British India in 1947, Baltistan was part of the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, having been conquered by Gulab Singh's armies in 1840.

However, four mountainous communities, including the village of Turtuk in the Nubra Valley, have been under Indian control since 1971, when they were all incorporated into the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir (now in Ladakh) after being captured by India during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971.

[8][9] The region is inhabited primarily by the Balti people, a largely Muslim ethnic group of Tibetan descent.

Baltistan is strategically significant to both Pakistan and India; the Siachen conflict and the Kargil War took place in this region alongside others.

[10] According to Ahmad Hassan Dani, Baltistan spreads upwards from the Indus river and is separated from Ladakh by the Siachen Glacier.

Religious artifacts such as gompas and stupas were built, and lamas played an important role in Balti life.

[16][17][18] For centuries, Baltistan consisted of small, independent valley states connected by the blood relationships of its rulers (rajas), trade, common beliefs and cultural and linguistic bonds.

The local population was Buddhist up until around the 14th century, when Sayyid Alī Hamadānī is credited with spreading Islam to the region.

Around 1595, the Mughal historian Abu'l-Fazl wrote that Kashmir was then importing silkworm eggs (for sericulture) from Gilgit and Baltistan.

One of them, Adam Khān, had fled to Kashmir and then sought refuge with the Mughal emperor Jahāngīr while Anchan was still alive.

Adam's elder brother (and rival) Abdāl was captured, and Zafar Khān announced Mughal suzerainty over Baltistan.

However, with winter coming, Zafar hastily withdrew his troops from Baltistan and appointed one of Abdāl's partisans to govern the territory on his behalf, which upset the Mughal emperor Shāh Jahān.

[21]: 243–4 The official Mughal historian Abdul Hamid Lahori left an account of Baltistan in his entry for the year 1638.

Its narrow mountain valleys could support limited cultivation, primarily of wheat and barley; certain fruits also thrived in the local climate.

Mangyal annihilated the Skardu garrison at Kharbu and put to the sword a number of petty Muslim rulers in the principalities of Purik (Kargil).

[27][28][29] Ali Sher Khan Anchan included Gilgit and Chitral in his kingdom of Baltistan,[30] reportedly a flourishing country.

The valley from Khepchne to Kachura was flat and fertile, with abundant fruit trees; the sandy desert now extending from Sundus to Skardu Airport was a prosperous town.

[31][32] On 29 August 2009 the government of Pakistan announced the creation of Gilgit–Baltistan, a provincial autonomous region with Gilgit as its capital and Skardu its largest city.

[citation needed] Skardu has several tourist resorts and many natural features, including plains, mountains and mountain-valley lakes.

Baltistan is a rocky wilderness of around 70,000 square kilometres (27,000 sq mi),[33] with the largest cluster of mountains in the world and the biggest glaciers outside the polar regions.

[37] Deosai National Park, in the southern part of the region, is habitat for predators since it has an abundant prey population.

Wild animals include ibex, markhor, musk deer, snow leopards, brown and black bears, jackals, foxes, wolves and marmots.

[41] The Maqpon ruler Ali Sher Khan Anchan introduced the game to other valleys during his conquests beyond Gilgit and Chitral.

The Daily K2[46] is an Urdu newspaper published in Skardu serving Gilgit-Baltistan for long time, and it is the pioneer of print media in Gilgit Baltisatn.