Democracy as a form of government is intended to serve the people. This includes protecting the right to protest peacefully and for people to put forward grievances in an organised manner before authorities. Yet we have seen in Pakistan time and again that people who attempt to use this right are mistreated by the police, to the extent of being assaulted and even having cases of sedition filed against them. This happened again in Islamabad this week where students, journalists, lawyers and activists, protesting the harassment and racial profiling of Baloch students at a university in the capital, were charged by the police – for the crime of protesting. In a ruling, IHC CJ Justice Athar Minallah, while hearing a petition moved by Imaan Hazir Mazari – one of the accused in the FIR filed by the police – has noted that it is in itself seditious ‘to suppress voices of dissent’.
This is not the first time the government has taken such an over-the-top route while handling a protest. In the past, peaceful students marching into Islamabad have faced teargas fire and other forms of police brutality, including batons. The same has happened to nurses, teachers, young doctors, farmers, and fisherfolk. On the other hand, we have cases where members of the traditionally more violent Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan have been allowed to march along roads and highways, and stage rallies blocking traffic for days, during which policemen were killed and injured and public property damaged.
As a state, we must learn to look at those who point out flaws in our system as heroes and not villains. Peaceful assembly is a fundamental right. The Baloch students protesting for their right to survive were not causing any disruptions of traffic, nor were they staging an agitation that could be termed as causing some law-and-order situation. Somewhere there is a discord in the manner the police handle protests and this needs to be put right. The police or any other government organ must understand that in any democratic state where people have rights protected under the constitution, including the right to peaceful association and peaceful protest, their duty is to protect these rights.
Our state functionaries – as the honourable court has also highlighted – must be accountable constitutionally and legally for any attempt to quell dissent or protest. If we treat peaceful protests as intolerable, how can we promote tolerance in society – especially among young people? Such demonstrations should not be counted as unpardonable and government functionaries should not be allowed to misuse their powers in such a blatant manner. Suppression of voices is in nobody’s favour; it suffocates society and results in violent behaviour – something we are seeing all too alarmingly in Pakistan. We must – as a nation – learn to live with the people’s right to protest and understand that all citizens in a democracy have a voice and a right to use that voice in a peaceful and organised manner without fear of violence by law-enforcement authorities.