Daily Times

I have served time with the Pakistan army at the peak of its power and authority, in solitary confinement and in an interrogation centre in some unknown place. I was informed by General Akhtar Abdur Rahman that I would be hanged. I still feel quite comfortable and positively about people in the army as I do about the people in civil society. Of course, I do not agree with all their thinking and habits but that certainly does not mean that I have to live in fear of them. And Mr Nawaz Sharif is our prime minister. I feel he ought to focus solely upon his conscience and his intelligence and take the best decisions that he can, including sacking some generals if he feels the need to do so in the line of his duty. I feel very strongly that we must look upon our armed forces as a part of our society and not as a different species. Mr Sharif should consult with the army in matters of policy that involve the army’s expertise and its responsibilities for running the army and not running the country. But policy decisions he has to take, and not try to seek an understanding with the army before a policy decision is taken. It would be bad for the army to try and have them ‘on board’ before he takes a decision. That would clearly be a failure of his constitutional and political mandate.

If we want to have an army of which we will be truly proud and which will enjoy respect in other countries, we need to keep it in its proper place. I also believe that the Army Act needs to be revisited by parliament and quite a few improvements can be made in it, including the repeal of certain clauses that were added by Mr Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto in 1973.

I find another anomaly in the current discourse in civil society of politicians vis-à-vis the army. It seems to me that the current situation and position of the superior judiciary and its sworn commitment to the constitution and to legality are somewhat being ignored. Whereas perhaps it is extremely relevant that today there is absolutely no question of any coup or attempted coup receiving approval from the superior judiciary as it has been receiving throughout our past history, I have heard no suggestion from any quarter that the army will win over the judiciary to its side in the event of staging a coup against Mr Sharif or Mr Asif Zardari or Mr Imran Khan. All evidence supports the assumption that no army coup will survive without a judicial approval of it by the Supreme Court. Surely it does not matter whether it happens before Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry’s retirement or thereafter. So even if the politicians are habitually afraid of the army, they have no reason to be in view of the judiciary’s crystallised position in the matter. I can only surmise that the politicians are looking for an alibi in the army in order to avoid doing things and making policies that they would find inconvenient for themselves and are putting the blame on the army, which I think is not fair.

One factor that I can think of as influencing the pro-status quo inclinations in our political debate is the problems that quite a sizeable section of our upper class intelligentsia have with the present judiciary. Obviously, they do not approve of the judiciary as it is. It is certainly not my case that the judges are angels or that they are always right. I would say that with all their shortcomings the judges have fewer character flaws than those that other people in positions of power and decision making have.

My perception, subject to correction, is that the intellectual elite in our country including army generals are distinctly uncomfortable with the superior judiciary. Because after 60 years of shared thinking and paradigms the judiciary has, in fact, deviated from the prevailing Pakistani norms. They have not only become radical compared to the privileged Pakistanis but are also willing to rock the boat. But most of us completely fail to understand why this has happened in the judiciary.

I would suggest a possible explanation for the judiciary breaking ranks with the mainstream of the privileged people in Pakistan. Perhaps it is because the judges have not become rich as other members of the elite have become over the last 60 years. They still find themselves stuck in the upper middle class bracket. My guess estimate is that the average net worth of a retired Supreme Court and High Court Judge is about Rs 100 million, which is nothing much to write home about in today’s figures for the upper strata of our society. The judges have no great future to look forward to after retirement. In fact, they recede into the background as individuals of no importance or consequence after their retirement. And they have to retire on the due date of their retirement and fade away. Perhaps the growing contrast between the prospects and conditions of the upper classes and the upper middle class judges has grown to a point where it has produced a more radical thinking. Not because they want more but because having less gives them greater freedom to think and to feel. It is unfortunate that in today’s Pakistan serious thinking in the right direction, in the best interests of the country, is considered to be radical.

If what I am saying is right I think our political thinkers should take a fresh look at the judiciary as a social segment and try to understand where they are coming from. I personally welcome this. I think it is very good for the country and hope that other sections of society will also proceed in that direction rather than being stuck in the quagmire of the status quo. So if we do not ignore the judiciary as a passing aberration then perhaps we will realise that it is a very weighty and important factor in the political dynamics operating in Pakistan today.

I do want to make a confession and that is that when the lawyers movement started about six years ago, I did not have any great expectations of it. In fact I was bordering on cynicism. And that was not because of the judges but because of my own colleagues who I thought were part of a political game and dubious funding. It was only a couple of years later when I looked at the facts more closely I was able to observe the slower pace of change among my own community of lawyers and the much greater pace of change in the smaller community of the superior court judges. Thereafter I could see the political potential of the change in the role of the judiciary at this time in our history.

(Concluded)

The writer is an advocate and director of Sanjannagar Institute of Philosophy and Arts. He can be reached at rkazim13@gmail.com