Daily Times

There is no sense in denying the popular sentiment or diminishing the connection any political party claims to have established with its vote bank, no matter how testing it may be.

It is an uncomfortable truth that every sitting government is forced to make peace with. Ergo, when the parliament passed the Peaceful Assembly and Public Order Bill 2024 ahead of a PTI rally, which had already been postponed twice (July and later August) due to revoked permission, it was treading on dangerous ground.

If rally organisers’ grievances about being conveyed the designated timeframe of the no-objection certificate when the protest demonstration was well underway, the authorities are willingly opening a can of worms, bound to hit them in due time. And going by the footage making rounds on television and social media, giving the police authorities a green signal to tear gas shells to disperse the crowd should be akin to a good douse of kerosene on an already raging fire of frustration.

It would greatly benefit the capital administration to conduct a thorough investigation (moving beyond filler proceedings) and inform the public about the relevant action taken.

Even if Minister Attaullah Tarar’s hard-hitting analysis on the failure of party leadership in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab to gather a sufficient presence holds merit, there are ample lessons in history to dissuade any civilian government from totalitarianism.

Whether it was the charged protestors or the overzealousness of the responding police officers that led to the chaos at Chongi No 26 needs to be established. Street protests in Pakistan tend to shake the resolve of a civilian government, due to which anyone who comes to power develops a weak stomach for voices of dissent. However, democratic principles cannot hover and flicker like wraiths, unsure of where they stand and where they will go.

If it was constitutionally permissible for coalition parties sitting on the treasury benches to march on Islamabad to present a significant political challenge to Imran’s government, it is equally applicable today. We cannot keep inventing the wheel just because the present definition does not suit us. *