The National Assembly last week passed the Electoral Reforms Bill 2017. That the attendance in the house fell way short of the required mark -- less than 50 members in a house of nearly 340 members -- on that significant day says something about the importance the legislators attach to the issue. Ironically, this is an issue that has kept the politics of this country volatile and even vulnerable since the last elections in 2013.

The new law is a consequence of three years of discussion on electoral reforms by a parliamentary committee. What remains to be seen is if it will lead to a more credible election process next time. Since PTI, the party that objected vociferously to the 2013 election, refuses to endorse the current bill, one wonders what lies in store. More importantly, whether the political parties and the public at large understand electoral reforms as a process and not a destination, and acknowledge the current bill as an improvement on the processes and systems that existed before.

Read also: Reforms in the making

There certainly is some movement further on the objectionable areas in the hefty changes proposed in the new law but, as Tahir Mehdi points out, the devil lies in the implementation. He rightly pinpoints the problems existing in the state machine and the political parties whose commitment regarding reforms is seriously questionable. He hints at the political dividends that were reaped by showing power on the streets against the election results, leaving one wondering if this might become a precedent for the future.

I.A. Rehman highlights another important issue. He says that "even dictatorial regimes have created election frameworks complete with up-to-date voters’ lists and rules for casting of votes and their accurate counting etc." but those elections are still not considered free, fair and credible. That is a valid question and MNA Mahmud Khan Achakzai has justifiably raised it on the floor of the National Assembly: "whether the establishment will permit a fair election at all".

Discussing electoral reforms at a time when democracy itself has been discredited, with no mean contribution by "immature and irresponsible politicians", is an unfortunate reality of the present times. Our Special Report today looks at the issue of electoral reforms in detail.