Unlike other countries of the region where groups that can be defined as purely terrorist outfits exist, the dividing line between socio-politico-religious groups and terrorist outfits is very hazy. Most groups that have actively participated in street violence and acts of terrorism are also active in the political landscape of Pakistan.

These political cum terrorist outfits can broadly be classified into two groups ethnic and sectarian. The Muttahida Quomi Mahaz (MQM-A, the suffix denoting the leadership of Altaf Hussain) which evolved from the Mohajir Quomi Movement, is the foremost among the ethnic based politico-terrorist formations in Pakistan. A break-away faction termed Haquiqi Mohajir Quomi Movement (literally meaning original MQM, and termed as MQM-H) was formed by two break-away leaders of the MQM, Afaq Ahmed and Aamir Khan in June 1992. The MQM-A and the MQM-H were locked in a violent war for domination of urban territory in the Sindh province. Following strong action taken by the Pakistani state in 1997-98, the MQM-A was seriously affected in terms of loss of cadre and equipment and has, since then, largely adopted peaceful means of protest.

Sectarian violence originated in a Shia-Sunni struggle for political space within a Pakistani State that was increasingly resorting to Islam as a tool of legitimacy since 1974. In that year, sectarian elements within the Shia and Sunni sects put up a united front and agitated for official action to declare the members of the Ahmediayya sect as non-Muslims, a demand that was accepted through the adoption of a Constitutional Amendment. Having tasted this victory over the State, these Shia and Sunni elements then turned against each other in an attempt to foist their respective religious interpretations as State doctrine.

The race for setting up rival sectarian outfits started with some Shia elements formed the Tehrik Nifaz-i-Fiqah-i-Jafria (TNFJ which means Movement for the Implementation of Fiqah-i-Jafria, a school of Islamic jurisprudence professed by the Shias, later the nomenclature was modified to Tehrik-i-Jafria Pakistan). In response to this attempt by a minority to impose its views over a majority, a Deobandi (a sub-sect within the Sunni sect) cleric, Maulana Haq Nawaz Jhangvi founded the Anjuman Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan (ASSP), later renamed as Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP) in Jhang, a district of Pakistani Punjab. This outfit evolved into a dubious political organisation which reportedly has a terrorist arm too while its offshoot, the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) is a dedicated terrorist outfit. Besides these two outfits, there are several socio-religious 'Sunni organisations' which are reportedly involved in sectarian violence but cannot be strictly defined as terrorist outfits. These include the various factions of the Ahle-Hadith and the Majlis-e-Dawah-wal-Irshad. Among the Shia outfits, the Sipah-e-Muhammad Pakistan (SMP), a splinter body of the TJP, which was formed by extremists of the latter to counter what was perceived as increasing terrorism indulged in by the SSP and the LeJ.

The targets of violence indulged in by these socio-religious outfits has included opposing sectarian leaders and workers, worshippers of the 'other' sects and Iranian diplomats in Pakistan. The latter are perceived by Sunni extremists as being actively involved in aiding Shia extremism. Given the overwhelming numerical domination of the Sunni sect in Pakistan, Sunni outfits attempting to force their individual version of Sunni Islam on the State have been more active as compared to their Shia rivals.

The rise and ebb of sectarian violence also points to the political ambitions of its perpetrators. A study of Jhang, the birthplace of the SSP and all subsequent Sunni violent movements, shows that while violence was rampant in the district until 1993, it tended to move away from the district to other parts of the province after the successful election of an SSP leader Maulana Azam Tariq to the National Assembly and two others to the provincial assembly.