Criminalising free speech
IF post-2016 were the years when Peca’s misuse against those exercising their right to freedom of speech and press freedom was tested, 2025 was the year when the gaps in…
Hostage by law
A BARRAGE of cases filed under various laws against lawyers working on issues the state wants silence on — where the law and Constitution are being undermined — shows how…
Criminalising Muslims
Every morning in today’s India begins with two parallel news cycles. One, broadcast on television screens, is carefully curated: Panel debates on Pakistan, Hindu pride, and endless theatre about a…
Criminalising child marriage
CHILD marriage persists in Pakistan for many reasons, and ending the practice requires measures that are sensitive to the problem’s complexity. Debates on child marriage tend to reduce this complexity…
Lawless world
We are living in an increasingly lawless, shadowy world — where international conventions and institutions are not just ignored, but actively undermined, as powerful states engage in acts amounting to…
International law & Indus wars
ON April 23, India unilaterally declared the Indus Waters Treaty to be “in abeyance” — a term neither recognised in treaty law nor found in the IWT itself. The Vienna…
Tax Laws (Amendment) Ordinance, 2025: Ill-advised, confiscatory & undemocratic
The President of Pakistan issued Tax Laws (Amendment) Ordinance, 2025, published in The Gazette of Pakistan on May 2, 2025, made effective at once. Presidential Ordinance No. IV of 2025…
IWT and lawfare in South Asia
Immediately after the terrorist incident at Pahalgam, India proceeded to a series of illegal, unlawful and unethical acts. First, it chose to indict a ‘country’ for a criminal act, which…
Autism and the law
THE UNDP Disability and Development Report 2024 is mind-boggling. Given Pakistan’s slide into ignominy, the country itself seems to be falling through the gaps of strange-sounding global developmental indices such…
Getting the law to work
A recent conviction under the Sindh Domestic Violence Act of 2013 is both a cause for celebration and reflection. Celebration as it shows that justice for domestic violence victims in…
