Islamabad, Jan 28 (IANS) Justice in several parts of rural Pakistan is not decided by evidence but by proximity to influence, a report has stated. When speaking about justice in Pakistan, the discussion usually unfolds in courtrooms, legal reforms, constitutional clauses, and televised outrage. However, the justice reveals its right form far from cameras and commentary, it detailed.
Highlighting the issue, leading Pakistani daily Dawn revealed that when a group of politically influential men decided that community development work had crossed an unacceptable line in rural parts of Sindh, they raised objection not against corruption or inefficiency but to ideas like girls attending school, women working outside their homes, women managing projects and exercising leadership. They termed these as signs of ‘social vice.’
“The first tactics were subtle. Men positioned themselves on roads used by school buses and women staff, standing in scant, obscene attire, leering and taunting. The intent was humiliation — a reminder that public space was not meant for women. Is justice a promise the state intends to honour? When this failed, the strategy escalated. Messengers arrived demanding that property be handed over,” rural development specialist and social entrepreneur Naween A Mangi wrote in a report in Dawn.
“The implication was clear: surrender what you have built and leave, or stay at your own risk. These demands were accompanied by routine nightly gunfire. When questioned, the explanation was almost mocking — they were merely ‘killing doves’. Eventually, ambiguity disappeared. Shots were fired openly at security personnel and staff on more than one occasion. The police were approached for protection. If an officer occasionally decided to show up after a report was filed, he joked openly that they had ‘received nothing’, and without such incentives how were they expected to act? Corruption did not even bother to cloak itself in euphemism,” she further stated.
The accused were quietly moved from there as pressure increased and rumours circulated that the police might intervene in the matter. Influential landlords provided them safe houses while those who were targeted continued to live in fear.
“In much of rural Pakistan, justice is not decided by evidence but by proximity to influence. Then another attack took place. A guard was fired upon. Again, formal complaints were filed. For months, letters were written — repeatedly and respectfully — to every rung of the police hierarchy: SP, SSP, DIG, IG. Not a single response was received. Silence, it seems, is also an institutional tool,” the Dawn opinion piece stated.
After the matter was raised in court, those who wanted protection were made to stand with the men who had fired at them. In the court, there was no acknowledgement of risk or vulnerability. Instead, the court scolded the victims for ‘causing trouble’ by forcing the accused to appear in court a number of times, as though persistence was an offence.
The leading Pakistani daily detailed that legal recourse was pursued upward thinking that a higher court might restore balance. However, it revealed another layer of decay as lawyers exploited desperation. Court fees were fabricated and costs were increased. Even before appearing in the court, the victims had been financially bled by those meant to represent them.
“This is the anatomy of injustice in Pakistan: police compromised by corruption and power, courts dulled by hierarchy and delay, and legal practitioners operating in an ecosystem where ethics are optional and consequences rare. None of this requires conspiracy. It survives on apathy, fear and the understanding that some lives and some causes are expendable,” wrote Mangi.
–IANS
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