A suspect may be guilty of a serious crime, but guilt is for a court to establish, not for the police to pronounce through a bullet or a confession extracted under torture. This distinction lies at the heart of the rule of law. In Pakistan, where allegations of extrajudicial killings, custodial abuse and discriminatory policing continue to surface, the credibility of law enforcement depends not simply on its ability to apprehend suspects, but on whether it exercises power within the limits of the law.
No serious country can afford a police force incapable of confronting terrorism, organised crime and violent offenders. Police officers face genuine dangers, often under difficult working conditions, and deserve the resources and institutional support necessary to protect the public. But effective policing and unchecked coercion are not the same thing. The authority to arrest, interrogate and use force is granted to the police for public protection, not as permission to bypass the judicial process.
The scale of reported police encounters in Pakistan makes this distinction particularly urgent. According to Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), media monitoring recorded 1,696 suspects killed in 1,155 police encounters nationwide in 2025. Punjab’s Crime Control Department (CCD) accounted for 977 deaths in 707 encounters. These figures do not establish that every fatal encounter was unlawful. They do, however, demand scrutiny of circumstances in which so many people die during operations conducted by an institution expected to bring suspects before the courts.
In February 2026, the HRCP called for a high-level judicial inquiry into CCD operations, reporting patterns it considered indicative of staged encounters and possible extrajudicial killings. The commission also raised concerns about the treatment of bereaved families and the consistency of official accounts. These are serious allegations, not judicial findings of guilt against every officer involved. Their seriousness makes independent investigation more necessary, not less.
The same accountability deficit is evident in cases of alleged custodial torture. Data submitted by Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) to the Lahore High Court showed that 364 inquiries had been registered nationwide under the Torture and Custodial Death (Prevention and Punishment) Act, 2022, by April 30, 2026. Only 52 had resulted in formal criminal cases. Punjab accounted for 266 inquiries but just 19 registered cases. These figures do not establish that every complaint is substantiated, but the gap between reported allegations and formal cases raises legitimate questions about the effectiveness of investigation and enforcement.
The deaths of a woman and a 17-year-old girl in Lahore police custody in August 2026 brought these concerns into sharp focus. Their families alleged torture, while police offered a different explanation. Human Rights Watch called for an independent criminal investigation to establish the facts and determine responsibility. More recently, the killing of a suspect in a Crime Control Department encounter in Bahawalpur has renewed these questions. Accused of fatally running over a teenage boy in Multan, the suspect had been arrested and remanded in police custody by a magistrate. Police subsequently claimed he escaped and died in an exchange of fire involving alleged accomplices.
In a separate Islamabad incident, a suspect reportedly died after being shot by his accomplices during an attack on a police team transporting him. These accounts may be accurate, but official explanations cannot substitute for independent verification. How often can suspects escape custody, encounter armed accomplices and die before standing trial? Such cases demand impartial investigations, forensic evidence and public accountability. A suspect’s death is not proof of justice served. The state must establish guilt through the courts, not leave the public choosing between competing accounts of a fatal encounter.
The problem extends beyond individual encounters and police stations. Allegations of arbitrary detention and extrajudicial violence have also emerged from Balochistan, particularly in cases involving activists and families of missing persons. Pashtun communities have raised concerns about security practices, while religious minorities, political opponents and impoverished citizens may face particular obstacles in seeking redress. These experiences are neither identical nor proof that every complaint is justified. Yet persistent allegations of selective enforcement demand institutions capable of investigating them impartially.
Policing becomes discriminatory when ethnicity, language, religion, political association or place of residence substitutes for evidence of individual wrongdoing. Such profiling does more than injure innocent citizens. It weakens the relationship between communities and the state, discourages cooperation with investigators and can deepen the alienation that violent groups exploit. Security operations that undermine public confidence may therefore weaken the very security they are intended to provide.
Pakistan’s legal framework already recognises the limits of state power. Articles 9, 10 and 14 of the Constitution protect life and liberty, establish safeguards against unlawful detention and prohibit torture for extracting evidence. The 2022 law criminalises custodial torture and related offences. The challenge is to translate these guarantees into consistent practice.
That requires independent investigations into custodial deaths and credible allegations of unlawful killings, preservation of forensic evidence and custody records, protection for witnesses, and prosecution where evidence establishes criminal responsibility. Officers implicated in serious allegations must not be allowed to influence investigations into their own conduct. Equally, officers acting lawfully must receive due process and protection against malicious accusations. Accountability should distinguish professional policing from abuse, not weaken the institution as a whole.
Ultimately, a police force earns public respect not through the number of suspects it kills or confessions it secures, but through its ability to prevent crime, gather reliable evidence and bring offenders to justice. The rule of law cannot demand obedience from citizens while granting those who enforce it immunity from scrutiny. Pakistan needs a police force strong enough to confront criminals, disciplined enough to respect constitutional rights and accountable enough to command public trust. That is not an obstacle to effective policing but the foundation of it.