The assassination of District and Sessions Judge Abdul Hakim Kakar and his security guard on the road to Mastung cannot – and should not – be reduced to yet another grim statistic from a province where terrorist violence has, with alarming frequency, sought to turn every semblance of normal life into a theatre of fear. A judge travelling to discharge his constitutional duty was targeted because the very idea of law, particularly when it is institutional, impartial and superior to the gun, remains an obstacle for those who wish to hold Balochistan hostage to violence.
To attack a judge is to send a message not merely to one court or district, but to every judicial officer expected to hear sensitive cases, every prosecutor required to place evidence before the law and every citizen who continues to believe that grievances, however serious, must be pursued through institutions rather than intimidation.
This killing did not take place in a vacuum. On July 12, five labourers from Punjab were shot dead in Mashkel, near the Pakistan-Iran border, after motorcycle-borne gunmen opened fire on the shops where they worked. Ten days later, armed men positioned on the surrounding hills sprayed a Quetta-to-Karachi passenger coach with bullets in Khadkocha, killing three passengers and wounding five. Between these attacks, gunmen near Mangochar opened fire on a vehicle carrying a family from Zhob, killing two women and injuring three others.
It is in this context that the rhetoric directed against the judiciary in recent weeks must be examined with the seriousness it deserves. Following the June 22 conviction of Baloch Yakjehti Committee leader Mahrang Baloch by an anti-terrorism court in Quetta, senior BYC figure Summy Din Baloch issued a statement accusing judges of tilting the scales of justice in favour of the powerful and behaving not as independent arbiters but as puppets of authority. Several voices in Balochistan subsequently warned that such language, especially in an already emotionally-charged environment, could contribute to an atmosphere in which judges were no longer treated as legitimate officers of the law but as permissible targets. Political organisations, of course, remain entitled to criticise judgments, challenge convictions, question the conduct of trials and pursue every remedy available under the Constitution. But there is a crucial difference between lawful criticism and language that strips judges of their humanity.
The people of Balochistan must also recognise the remorseless logic of the armed groups claiming to act in their name. Their victims have included Punjabis and Baloch, civilians and officials, men and women, workers and children. Their violence observes no boundary of ethnicity, religion, class or innocence because its purpose is not the protection of the Baloch people but the creation of disorder in which development becomes impossible, and fear replaces political choice. *