Police Reforms in Pakistan: Legal Framework, Implementation Failures, and the Way Forward

Abstract

Police reforming has been among the most thorny and unsolved dilemmas within the governance and rule of law system in Pakistan. Even after years of legal intervention, policy efforts, and judicial guidelines, the institution of police remains one of political interference, ineffective accountability, and inefficient services provision as well as mistrust by the populace. This article is a critical review of the legal framework of police reform in Pakistan, identifies structural and institutional factors that have led to the same implementation failure, and offers possible avenues to implementing reforms to be sustained. It claims that despite various reform-based legal tools that have been taken to the country such as police orders and provincial laws, the structures have not done much to bring about any noticeable change because of the deep political motivations of the government, opposition at the administrative levels, and lack of organizational independence. The paper also argues that police reform in Pakistan has not been addressed as one of the basic aspects of democratic government and constitutional rule of law but as a technical or administrative challenge. The article points out the necessity of a holistic and politically-based approach to police reform by placing police reform in the wider context of civil-military relationship, federalism and accountability systems. It concludes that reforms in policing must not be limited to redesign in legislation, but also by real political will, consistency in the judiciary, and participation of the society to turn the police into a service provider that is answerable to the law and the populace.