The recent barbaric murder of a couple on the outskirts of Quetta — executed on the orders of a tribal jirga — yet again exposes the dangerous impunity with which ‘honour’ killings are carried out in Pakistan. Despite a flurry of statements, arrests, and judicial actions, one is forced to ask: How many more deaths will it take for the state to assert its writ with clarity and resolve?
The chilling video of the couple being led into a desert and gunned down, now seared into public memory, has shaken the nation’s conscience. It shouldn’t have required viral footage to spark action, yet this has become a tragically familiar pattern. Once again, justice lags behind violence. Once again, the law trails culture.
Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti’s declaration of this case as a “test” for his government is commendable in words — but will actions follow? Eleven suspects may have been arrested, and the state’s involvement acknowledged, yet these steps offer little solace against the backdrop of an alarming and chronic failure of implementation. The mere fact that a parallel system like a tribal jirga can decide life or death in 21st-century Pakistan is a damning indictment of state abdication.
According to the Sustainable Social Development Organisation’s 2024 report, 547 honour killings were reported nationwide in just one year — with conviction rates below 2%. This is not a lapse in enforcement; it is systemic collapse. From 2022 to 2024, over 1,500 people have died in so-called honour killings. These are not isolated crimes of passion — they are the byproducts of a broken, feudal, patriarchal order that continues to enjoy tacit immunity under the guise of “culture.”
The law exists. The Constitution exists. Pakistan’s Penal Code, the Anti-Terrorism Act, and multiple Supreme Court rulings condemn such extrajudicial killings in no uncertain terms. But in large swathes of the country, particularly in tribal belts and feudal strongholds like parts of Balochistan, these legal frameworks remain impotent. The continuation of tribal jirgas is not just unconstitutional — it is criminal.
Even in this case, while CM Bugti has said that “the state stands with the oppressed,” there’s an uncomfortable attempt to distance the woman from any potential ‘honourable’ justification by clarifying that she was not a newlywed, but a mother of five. This is a dangerous caveat. The nature of her relationship is irrelevant. Nothing — not love, not social status, not marital status — justifies murder. The notion that ‘honour’ can be tainted by a woman’s autonomy is at the rotten core of this violence, and it must be confronted head-on.
This moment demands more than reactive policing and political posturing. It requires structural reforms: the disbanding of jirgas, strict enforcement of existing laws, protection for whistleblowers and witnesses, and most critically, a shift in political will. Feudal lords and tribal leaders must no longer be allowed to act as sovereigns over the lives of others. No culture, no tradition, no community should stand above the Constitution.
It is time to move past treating such crimes as exceptions or “test cases.” Honour killings are not anomalies — they are part of a deeply entrenched societal sickness. The state must act, not only in this high-profile case but across every district, with consistency and commitment. Justice delayed, as always, is justice denied — but in this case, it may also cost more lives.
The writ of the state must not merely be invoked in press conferences; it must be implemented — forcefully, fearlessly, and fully. The people of Pakistan deserve nothing less.
