Shahid Aziz aka Gullu Butt possesses the ability to stir debate. Earlier, he was in the spotlight after footage of him smashing cars in Model Town, Lahore, on June 17 this year was telecast.

Then he was accused of being an agent aiding the police in intimidating the Pakistan Awami Tehreek. And now the point of discussion is his conviction by an anti-terrorist court.

Also read : Gullu Butt sentenced to 11 years in prison

Aziz has been given an 11-year term and asked to pay a fine of over Rs100,000. Immediately after the verdict on Thursday, PAT officials reacted by saying this punishment for an individual, who has been projected in the media as temperamental and as someone who might have been moved by an overbearing sense of political affiliation, was not their objective.

And as the PAT spokesman reiterated the demand for satisfactory legal action against those responsible for brutally extinguishing 11 lives that June morning, there have been calls by others who fear that the Gullu Butt case might be used to eclipse the real crime in this instance.

Over and above the Model Town incident, this conviction is already being cited as an example of how the law is quick to pounce on some while it is unable to bring others to justice.

Also read: On trail of Gullu Butt

This is a strong counter-argument, one whose proponents risk being chastised for taking their cynicism to a level where they might be perceived as opposing the conviction of a man whose crime was so obvious.

The point that needs to be pondered is that Pakistan could be rid of much of its scepticism if the law was to move with equal efficiency and purpose in the case of everyone put on trial or booked by the police.

In reviews of the present case, eventually the critical question might be about the need for the courts to not in any way be affected by any notions of populism and to keep their focus tightly fixed on dispensing justice to all with an even hand.

Published in Dawn, November 2nd, 2014