On June 3, 2022, Prime Minster Shehbaz Sharif notified the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) as the Special Vetting Agency (SVA) for the verification and screening of all civil servants from induction to promotions and postings. No one knows the reason for such a step. Per se, the decision is an expression of no-confidence in the civilian vetting agencies such as the Intelligence Bureau (IB) at the centre and the Special Branch (SB) in provinces. The question is this: where have these agencies failed to perform the assigned task to raise the need for an alternative mechanism? Sharif has taken a wrong turn, which is bound to create asymmetry in the system. Civilian officers hate to be dominated by non-civil servants, be they from the military or the National Accountability Bureau (NAB). Whereas subjecting civil servants to the NAB was the undoing of the government of the Pakistan Tehreek-e Insaf (PTI), exposing civil servants to the ISI would be the ruination of the incumbent government run by the Pakistan Democratic Movement and represented by Sharif. It is now a fashion that politicians fail to gauge the abilities of civil servants and subject them to one psycho-mental torture or the other. As a matter of principle, civilian governments need to rely on civilian officers, the bureaucracy, which is selected through a stringent prolonged process of a civil-service examination, whether provincial or central. Compared to that, a NAB officer is inducted after passing a 100 marks-objective type paper. These officers are no match for the expanse of the brain developed by civil servants, especially those who qualify for the country-wide held yearly examination of Central Superior Services (CSS). Similarly, CSS-qualified officer is far better intelligent and more academically qualified than their counterparts, who are recruited into the Pakistan Army after matriculation or Intermediate and Secondary Education. The civil service is meant for serving the country and not the masters of the military. Through the notification, subjecting civil servants to the ISI is a great insult. Sharif has taken a wrong turn, which is bound to create asymmetry in the system. Interestingly, the notification comes with the inherent paradox that civil servants are incapable of running the IB and SB to vet the credentials of fellow civil servants, but civil servants are capable of managing the country’s affairs. The point is simple: There are a number of honest and dedicated civil servants who can improve the performance of these civilian vetting agencies if they are underperforming. Has the incumbent government exhausted this option before issuing the notification? The answer is in the negative. In fact, the notification is meant for misaligning the whole system of administration, making the military dominate the bureaucracy. In principle, if discontented with the performance of civilian vetting agencies, Sharif should have introduced new rules and seen the effects before issuing the notification, or the notification should have been declared an interim arrangement till the time civilian vetting agencies are strengthened by rules and regulations. In other words, civilian governments should rely on civilian officers and assign them the task of refining the IB and SB for this purpose. If they fail to perform, only then can a new agency get space. The original task of the ISI is to safeguard national security. The ISI is led by a Director General (DG) who happens to be a Lieutenant General from the Pakistan Army. The agency primarily consisted of military officers from three services (army, navy and air force), though civilians are also recruited to work as insulated subordinates. The DG ISI submits reports to both the PM and the Chief of Army Staff (COAS). Interestingly, a few years ago, the agency was under civilian command, but this is not the case now. Sharif has to explain first how come the ISI report to the COAS when the agency has to fall within the civilian ambit. Has Sharif issued any notification, in this regard, to bring the ISI back to the civilian prerogative, to report only to the PM? The answer is in the negative. Instead of delimiting the agency, Sharif has favoured the agency with more powers. This is how Pakistan’s political and democratic future is marred by politicians themselves. The ISI has three publicly known wings: internal, external and foreign relations. Each is headed by a Major General. Of relevance is the internal wing, which is responsible for gathering domestic intelligence against espionage and terrorism. Unfortunately, the internal wing is notorious for working in the political domain to make and break political parties and manipulate elections. The role – to decide on Pakistan’s political future – is beyond the ISI’s mandate, no matter how many conscientious officers it comprises. The pre-poll scenario of the 2018 general elections was a testament to this fact. Inexperienced politicians were sought after. The consequent hybrid regime failed to manage Pakistan and the economy took a nose dive. This was the performance of the ISI’s internal wing. Now, it is given the task of vetting civilian officers. That is, the agency which failed to vet the credentials of politicians it was supporting to rule the country is now given the task of vetting civil servants. Sharif also overlooked the fact that, in the domain of intelligence gathering on terrorism domestically, civilian intelligence agencies performed better than the ISI did. In several cases reported in the press, civilian intelligence agencies informed the ISI beforehand of suicide attacks on military installations and buildings, for example, the attack on the General Headquarters in Rawalpindi, the attack on the ISI office in Lahore, attacks on the air force bases in Karachi and Peshawar, and the attack on a children’s school in Peshawar. The question is simple: if the ISI remains tangled with civilian affairs, when will it find time to do its actual task? One theory is that Sharif wants to neutralize the Supreme Court (SC) by engaging the ISI in the vetting process. In this connection, before the SC, the government has not argued about the court’s jurisdiction and the constitutional obligation of the civilian government to do postings and transfers. Without doing so, the theory is unfounded that Sharif wants to neutralize the SC. In short, civil servants should be scrutinized by the civilians, though an occasional help can be sought from the ISI in selected complicated cases, but this help should not be made a general rule and obligation as done by the notification. The writer can be reached at qaisarrashid @yahoo.com