With a majority verdict, a 10-member bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan last week upheld the review petitions thereby overturning an earlier judgment of the court requiring an investigation that could have led to proceedings by the Supreme Judicial Council resulting in the removal of a judge in line to be elevated to the august office of chief justice of Pakistan. Predictably perhaps, the case has been a great polariser. While there are those rejoicing in the outcome, others have voiced concern about its implications for the idea of nobody being above transparent accountability.

Elsewhere, a prominent political leader charged with corruption and money laundering was granted an unusual bail pending trial in an accountability court and another granted protection against surprise arrest. There were those who said that in another country likes of them would have been behind bars with little hope of release.

A senior law enforcement officer, now retired, made waves by coming up with accusations of having been under pressure from the incumbent government leaders to unfairly prosecute certain people, including political opposition. This, too, stirred impatient debate with some going as far as to say that if important people could not be prosecuted successfully and acquittal of those accused of corruption was to be the norm, why not just give up the accountability façade.

In independent comparisons Pakistan’s justice system is ranked 120^th out of 128 countries. A serious dialogue, it appears, is called for to identify the problems afflicting it and devising methods to fix those problems.

What happens when rule of law is flouted with impunity and the system of justice is ridiculed? Sooner or later, vigilante justice takes over. Waiting in a queue last week for my turn to be vaccinated, I could overhear random people praying for some individual or group of people who will enforce the law no matter if he/they lacked the authority to do so. Robin Hood, the legendary nemesis for the rich and saviour of the poor, was mentioned. The inspiration for this column came from that grassroots discourse.

So how do academics see vigilante justice? Vigilante justice is frequently welcomed as a relief in a general state of disarray or lawlessness in areas where a formal justice system has yet to be established or the rudimentary policing apparatus has proved inadequate in the face of rampant crime. In various parts of the world and at different phases of history it was not uncommon for citizens (called “regulators”) to band together in “committees of vigilance” to combat crime.

Saad Rizvi commands the kind of following that could be motivated to turn against those accused of corruption but clearly lacks the experience.

Vigilante justice has been practiced in many countries under unsettled conditions whenever informally organised groups have attempted to supplement or replace legal procedure or to fill the void where institutional justice has been corrupted. When that happens, victims frequently become oppressors and then no one can rein them in. The elite suffer the most. It appears that frustrations and anger in the Pakistani society need only a wily demagogue to channelise it. It was in fact the anger against the system that motivated them recently take to the streets and do all the violence. The system of justice is the linchpin in a civilised society. If that is compromised, the state and society go down the drain. Saad Rizvi showed that he had the kind of following that could be motivated to turn against those accused of corruption, but he clearly lacks experience.

While acknowledging that there were rogue elements, the principled vigilantes, according to historian Hubert Howe Bancroft, were the embodiment of democracy, “watching the welfare of the commonwealth, using force only when all other means fail, using its power with moderation, tempering justice with mercy, and gladly relinquishing its distasteful duties the moment it can do so with safety.”

One wishes that such a system strikes roots in Pakistan. But the reality has been hugely different. Some vigilantes in the West fell for torture and even parading of human trophies in their dispensation of ‘justice’. The skin of a “ferocious bandit” hung by vigilantes in 1891 was tanned and made into various consumer items, including a medical bag and a pair of lady’s shoes (displayed at a local bank in Wyoming).

In Pakistan, where so many are accused of money laundering, accumulation of illicit wealth and stealing from development funds, what course will vigilante justice take?

To conclude this column, I wish to share what Meena Radhakrishna wrote in her article, Crime of Vigilante Justice, published in Economic and Political Weekly, quite a while back. Her conclusion is important for all of us because of her unusual perspective on vigilante justice; it seems in complete correspondence with the situation in today’s Pakistan.

She says there is an utter lack of faith in the two institutions — the justice system and the police — as these institutions have been rendered hollow. Of course, these two institutions leave much to be desired from the point of view of the general public as well. The much-discussed failure of the justice system seems to have taken place. The criminals are confident that the justice system will not act against them, so they go ahead and indulge in illegal, violent and corrupt practices. Speedier trials are de nitely needed.

As for failure of law and order machinery, let’s take up the subject on some other occasion.

The writer is Professor in the faculty of Liberal Arts at the Beaconhouse National University, Lahore