PoK agitation spotlights growing disconnect between Islamabad's rhetoric and reality: Report
Islamabad, June 20
The massive agitation in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir has exposed a widening gap between Pakistan's Kashmir rhetoric and the realities on the ground, with a report highlighting that Islamabad's narrative abroad rests on the very principles it tramples at home.
It argued that calls for dignity and justice for Kashmiris at the United Nations ring hollow when similar demands in PoK are met with restrictions and crackdowns.
"There is a peculiar genius to Pakistan's ruling order: it can take a people asking for flour, electricity, dignity, representation, and constitutional accountability and, with the dead-eyed solemnity of a clerk stamping a death warrant, declare the whole thing terrorism," a report in 'Kashmir Times' stated.
"This is the miracle of the Pakistani security state. It manufactures poverty, strangles politics, humiliates citizens, imprisons the popular, bombs the peripheral, disappears the inconvenient, and then clutches its medals in theatrical astonishment when the governed begin to object," it added.
The report stated the protests in PoK did not "descend from abstraction" but stemmed from long-standing grievances.
This was the result of rising electricity bills, wheat prices, unemployment, inflation, concerns over constitutional manipulation, and growing frustration that local voices remain marginalised.
The report noted that what makes the current situation volatile is not only repression in PoK but also the wider perception that the region has become "one chamber in a larger national anatomy of fear."
Highlighting that repression of Pakistani authorities extends beyond PoK, it said, "Pashtuns displaced by wars they did not choose are treated as suspects in their own homeland. Baloch families, demanding the return of the disappeared, are lectured about national security by the very institutions that made disappearance a language of governance. Supporters of Imran Khan are not engaged as citizens with political preferences but diagnosed as a contagion to be quarantined."
According to the report, tens of thousands of Pakistanis have come to believe that public expression is tolerated only when it praises those in power, mourns selectively, or criticises external actors in line with official narratives.
"The state's moral universe is now magnificently simple. A Kashmiri resisting India is heroic. A Kashmiri resisting Islamabad is manipulated. A Pashtun mourning a drone strike is suspect. A Baloch mother holding a photograph is a threat. A voter supporting the wrong party is diseased. A student asking why Generals own the future is an agent. By this logic, Pakistan is not a country. It is a courtroom. The accused are always ordinary citizens. The judge always arrives in uniform," it stated, highlighting the shrinking space of dissent in Pakistan.
— IANS
Reader Comments
As someone who lived in Islamabad for a few years, I can tell you the disconnect between the military establishment and the people is massive. The report is spot on about how they treat dissent. India isn't perfect, but at least we have a functioning democracy where you can question the government without disappearing.
The report mentioning how a Kashmiri resisting India is "heroic" but a Kashmiri resisting Islamabad is "manipulated" — that's the Pakistani double standard in a nutshell. They export terrorism and oppression while pretending to be champions of freedom. Good to see this being called out.
I'm genuinely saddened by this. Pakistani citizens in PoK aren't asking for something unreasonable — just food, electricity, and dignity. And the state calls that "terrorism"? That's heartbreaking. No country should treat its own people like this. Makes me appreciate India's democratic framework even more.
The report's description of Pakistan as "a courtroom where the accused are always citizens and the judge always arrives in uniform" is chilling. This is what happens when a country is run by its military instead of its people. India has its problems, but at least our generals don't decide elections.
Reading this makes me think about how the world always focuses on India-Pakistan tensions, but rarely looks at what's happening *inside* Pakistan. The people of PoK, Balochistan, and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa are suffering silently while their government plays victim at international forums. Time for the world to see the real picture.
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