The IT ministry’s clarification that the proposed telecom amendments do not authorise compulsory acquisition of private land is relevant only up to a point. It does not answer the central objection. The issue is not confined to acquisition. The bill also concerns access, deemed consent, compensation, official discretion and penalties – all of which go to the practical control citizens exercise over their own property.
The Pakistan Telecommunication (Re-organisation) (Amendment) Bill, 2026, which was already passed by the National Assembly and is now before the Senate committee, does more than streamline Right of Way approvals.
Most significantly, what was earlier understood as Right of Way is recast as “access by licensee for telecommunication infrastructure”, including the right to enter upon, use or pass over public or private land, premises or property for telecom systems, ICT infrastructure, optical fibre cables, towers and related equipment.
That is not a minor drafting shift. It expands the legal imagination of access from passage over land to entry and use of premises. The bill also extends “private access” to individually owned property as well as organised ownership structures such as housing societies, cooperative housing schemes and residential or commercial estate management entities. More troublingly, the draft bars any fee, rent or compensation for collectively owned private property. It then empowers the appropriate government to fine an owner, lessee, tenant or entity up to Rs 5 crore for obstructing or delaying access.
The minister has argued that necessary changes in wording will be made and that the fine would apply only where an agreement had been reached by mutual consent and then violated by the landowner or property owner. If that is the intent, the bill should have said so from the start.
It is also no answer to shift responsibility towards the committee proceedings or PPP’s Naveed Qamar for proposing specific amendments. The bill was tabled by the ministry, and by this logic, the ministry must explain how a draft with such perverse regulatory logic and such obvious implications for fundamental rights got this far.
Pakistan needs fibre, towers, 5G readiness and a rational Right of Way regime. There’s no denying that. Operators do face arbitrary local charges, fragmented approvals and delays that hurt investment and service quality. Agreed. But reform should discipline permissions, not convert private telecom licensees into quasi-sovereign actors.
Article 24 of the Constitution protects citizens from being deprived of their property, and highlights how even the state cannot compulsorily acquire private property without providing just compensation. Secure property rights are also an economic necessity as they underpin housing markets, entrepreneurship and long-term investment. Weakening them to reduce rollout costs for private firms is bad law and bad economics.
Pakistan does not need a digital-age East India Company model in which private commercial entities acquire state-backed privileges over citizens’ property in the name of infrastructure. *