Since its inception as a new state in August 1947, Pakistan is facing the dilemma of elites monopolizing power and resources of the country. The phenomenon of elite capture is not new. It denotes to grabbing of power and resources by the privileged class in order to perpetuate its hold over power. Consisted on powerful and privileged strata of society, elite can positively use its power and authority to benefit common people and can at the same time deprive the majority of its rights. Unfortunately, in Pakistan elite capture is aimed to protect the interests of privileged segment of society at the expense of overwhelming majority of people.

According to a study of Pakistan Institute of Development Economics by Fahd Zulfiqar and Abbas Moosvi published in 2022, “Inarguably, the concept of elite capture is broadly defined along the axis of political economy. Therefore, the articulation of elite capture with inequality, power, extraction, and appropriation is organic, which is also the reason why existing scholarship has focused on building these relationships. There are, however, lacunae when it comes to developing a comprehensive understanding of elite capture. Based on the existing scholarship, this brief entails to unpack elite capture on theoretical and pragmatic levels.” When resources of a country are captured by a segment of political, bureaucratic, military and corporate elites, the outcome is the deepening of the country’s economic and political predicament

According to Cambridge Dictionary, elite means “those people and organizations considered the best or most powerful compared to others of a similar type.” If the elite adhere to democracy, good governance and the rule of law, it can help pull the majority of people from the web of poverty, illiteracy and underdevelopment. But, if the elites are exploitive and ruthless in usurping the resources of country and imposing their authority the result is the fragility and failing of state.

Coming to the phenomenon of elite capture in Pakistan, since the 1950s till today, the privileged classes........

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