Mastuj side of old Chitral · 8,392 km² · 195,528 people in 2023 · no urban row in the census table
If Lower Chitral is the town under Trich Mir, Upper Chitral is the long up-valley: Mastuj, Buni, Torkhow, Mulkhow, and the road that climbs toward Shandur. The district is huge on a map and thin on the ground. Twenty-three people per square kilometre is the 2023 density. The Bureau printed the whole unit as rural.
Households: 26,365. Population: 195,528. Literacy: 73.83 percent — 84.87 percent for men, 62.11 percent for women. That female figure is higher than most of southern KP. Winter still decides whether a girl in a side valley actually reaches class in January.
Khowar is the language of almost every counted household (the census “other language” row is essentially Khowar here). Wakhi is spoken toward the northern passes. Pashto is rare in this table, unlike Drosh down-valley.
PBS Table 1 for 2023 lists Upper Chitral as one block: Mastuj sub-division, 8,392 km², same population as the district. Local administration also uses valley names that are not always given their own census line: Buni, Torkhow (Torkoh), Mulkhow (Mulkoh). When a later tehsil book prints separate numbers, this page should follow that book. Until then, treat Mastuj as the official row and the others as living valley names.
Mastuj is the old fort-and-bazaar name of the upper river. Buni is the large settlement many families treat as their town. Torkhow and Mulkhow are the inhabited side valleys, not empty labels. Shandur pass is the polo-ground story the rest of the country already knows; it is a seasonal road, not a third city.
Do not copy the Kalash valley list onto this page. Those valleys sit with Lower Chitral / Ayun.
Degree work still points down to Chitral town or out through Lowari. Upper Chitral keeps government colleges and high schools in the main settlements; specialist hospital beds are not in Mastuj. A DHQ-style facility is what people ask for when they talk about the new district, not a second university.
On population alone, Upper Chitral did not clear the 2023 provincial-seat threshold. Coverage has been discussed as a combined Upper-and-Lower seat. That is an Election Commission arithmetic note, not a local insult.
Sources: PBS 2023 Table 1 and literacy tables; KP notifications creating Upper Chitral from the old district. Checked September 2026.