After the creation of Bangladesh in 1971, the next before-and-after year for Pakistan was 1979. One local and four international developments left an everlasting impact on the evolution of our country. The war in Afghanistan never ended. After the Russian defeat, a civil war started, leading to the rise of the Taliban. Then 9/11 happened and the second Afghan war commenced. Even after the Americans left in 2021, Pakistan has continued to face the consequences of the Taliban regime, which for the last about one year has developed very acrimonious relations with the very people who acted more than brothers and hosted millions of them for nearly 50 years.

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Combined with the above, many other internal and external factors have led to serious upheavals in our society. The biggest brunt of increased militancy, extremism, insurgency, violence and other very negative developments has been faced by the police force. From being a primarily rural policing model, police had to change gears nearly overnight and adapt to the anti-terrorism mode, taking on the most dangerous militants belonging to Al-Qaeda, ISIS-KP/ISKP, BLA, TTA, TTP, Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP)/East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), to name a few.

The Lal Masjid operation in 2007 unleashed the curse of suicide bombing in Pakistan, which has continued over the last two decades. Besides terrorism, organised crime, sectarian violence, ethnic mayhem and extremism have also played a substantial part in changing the ethos of policing.

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Despite a lingering undesirable public image, for which police cannot be absolved of their responsibilities, the fact remains that........

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