Business Recorder Editorials 9th August 2026

Abuse of authority

EDITORIAL: The alleged rape of a mentally challenged young woman inside Lahore’s Ghaziabad police station exposes the devastating consequences of unchecked state power. While the criminal investigation should be allowed to proceed without prejudice and the accused is entitled to due process, the allegations, if proven, point to a catastrophic failure of policing, supervision, and accountability. Few crimes can inflict greater damage on the legitimacy of law enforcement than one committed within the very premises meant to provide protection and justice.

The Punjab Police’s decision to suspend the entire staff of the station is an extraordinary measure, reflecting the gravity of the incident. The rationale offered by the Lahore DIG that no officer questioned why a woman had been brought to the police station in the absence of female personnel or why established procedures had not been followed underscores a troubling institutional culture in which silence and negligence appear to have displaced vigilance and professional responsibility. While such collective administrative action cannot substitute for individual criminal liability, it does acknowledge that institutional failures rarely occur in isolation.

Particularly distressing is the reported vulnerability of the victim. The state’s duty of care is greatest for those least able to protect themselves. Instead, according to the allegations, that vulnerability was exploited by someone entrusted with enforcing the law. If these allegations are proven, the crime would represent not merely the misconduct of a single official but a grave abuse of state authority.

The prompt registration of the FIR, the arrest of the accused officer, the intervention of the prosecutor general and the judicial oversight of the investigation are necessary and welcome developments. However, public confidence will depend less on these initial steps than on whether the investigation remains impartial and the prosecution is conducted with professionalism, transparency and independence. Pakistan has witnessed too many cases in which justice is delayed or diluted as public outrage subsides. This case must not be allowed to follow that familiar pattern.

The episode also raises broader questions about policing standards in Pakistan. Police stations cannot remain opaque spaces where supervisory mechanisms are weak and internal accountability is largely reactive. Compliance with existing procedures governing the handling of women, the mandatory presence of female personnel, functional surveillance systems, proper visitor registers and effective internal oversight cannot be dismissed as administrative formalities. They are essential safeguards designed to prevent abuses of authority and protect those who seek the state’s help.

Restoring public confidence will require more than securing the conviction of one accused official. It demands sustained institutional reform that strengthens oversight, enforces professional standards, and reinforces the principle that no one — especially those entrusted with enforcing the law — is above it. Justice for the victim is imperative, so too is ensuring that police stations remain places of safety rather than fear. Only then can confidence in law enforcement begin to be restored.

Planning for 400 million

EDITORIAL:The health ministry’s warning that Pakistan’s population could reach 400 million by 2040 should have triggered far more than another official expression of concern. Instead, the projection announced by Minister of State for Health Dr Mukhtar Ahmad Bharath risks joining a long list of alarming forecasts that briefly dominate headlines before quietly disappearing beneath the weight of official indifference. It deserves attention because it quantifies a crisis that Pakistan has spent decades acknowledging but remarkably little time confronting. If current trends continue, the country will soon find itself attempting to provide jobs, schools, hospitals, housing, water and food for a population that its economy is already struggling to support today.

Pakistan has debated population growth for decades. Governments have announced policies, launched awareness campaigns, established councils and repeatedly declared family planning a national priority. Yet the country’s demographic trajectory has barely changed. Every few years another government rediscovers the problem, promises decisive action and then quietly allows the issue to drift back into the background until the next set of alarming statistics appears.

The consequences have become impossible to ignore. Pakistan is already among the world’s most populous countries, yet unlike most others at the top of that list it occupies a comparatively modest land area with finite natural resources and fragile public infrastructure. Every year, population growth places additional pressure on schools that cannot accommodate enough students, hospitals that cannot treat enough patients, cities that cannot provide enough housing, and labour markets that cannot generate enough productive employment. The debate is no longer about future risks. It is about a crisis that is already visible across almost every sector of national life.

Perhaps the most troubling aspect is that millions of Pakistani children begin life at a disadvantage they did nothing to deserve. More than 60 percent are affected by stunting or related forms of malnutrition, limiting physical development, cognitive ability and long-term productivity. That alone should have transformed population management into one of the country’s foremost national priorities. Bringing more children into circumstances where adequate nutrition, healthcare and education remain beyond the reach of many families serves neither those children nor the country’s future. Population policy cannot be separated from human development because the two are inseparable.

The minister was therefore right to emphasise parental responsibility and wider access to reproductive healthcare. Modern family planning remains underutilised, while preventable maternal health complications continue imposing heavy social and economic costs. Better awareness, stronger primary healthcare and easier access to reproductive health services are all necessary parts of the solution. They are, however, only part of it, because the larger failure lies in governance.

Population management has never received the sustained political attention reserved for other national priorities. Governments have tended to approach it through periodic campaigns rather than continuous policy. The creation of another national council may well prove useful, but Pakistan has created committees, commissions and task forces before. Their existence has rarely translated into measurable improvements because implementation has consistently lagged behind official declarations.

If the government genuinely considers population growth a national emergency, then it should treat it as one. Clear national targets should be published for contraceptive use, maternal healthcare, female education, child nutrition and population growth itself. Provincial governments should be required to report progress regularly, while independent assessments should measure whether policies are actually changing outcomes rather than simply producing official statements. Public awareness campaigns cannot substitute for measurable performance.

Pakistan’s demographic challenge is steadily becoming an economic challenge, a healthcare challenge, an education challenge and, ultimately, a governance challenge. Every year that meaningful action is postponed makes the eventual adjustment more difficult and more expensive. The warning of 400 million people by 2040 should therefore mark more than another moment of official concern. Pakistan has spent years talking about population growth as though it were tomorrow’s problem. It has already become today’s.