At its inception on 14 August 1947, the Dominion of Pakistan, similarly to the neighbouring Dominion of India, did not include its princely states, which gradually acceded over the next year. The nation's status as a federal dominion within the British Empire ended in 1956 with the formal drafting of the Constitution of Pakistan, which officially established the country as the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The constitution also administratively split the nation into West Pakistan and East Pakistan, which were until this point governed as a singular entity despite being completely separate geographic exclaves. In 1971, following a liberation war between Pakistan Armed Forces (aided by East Pakistani loyalists) and ethnic Bengali rebels known as the Mukti Bahini, the territory of East Pakistan seceded from the union with Indian military support to form the independent People's Republic of Bangladesh.