THE renewal of the Sindh Rangers’ mandate to stay in Karachi has rarely made the news.

That wasn’t surprising, considering that the paramilitary force — whose mandate can be extended for a maximum of four months — has been deployed in Karachi since 1989, in some capacity or the other, to assist the city police in maintaining law and order.

But what was routine once is no longer so, since the Rangers — who were given special powers of policing and arrest in late 2013 — have turned their guns, so to speak, on individuals in the provincial government for their purported misdeeds.

That would explain Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah’s eleventh-hour recollection about constitutional requirements that needed to be met following the 18th Amendment, which incidentally was passed in April 2010, for extending the Rangers’ law-enforcement mandate in Karachi.

In any event, after some hemming and hawing, the extension has been granted, albeit for one month.

Read more: Sindh CM warns Rangers against acting beyond authority

It was not an unexpected outcome, given the army’s support for the Rangers-led operation in Karachi and, apparently, all that it entails.

This was underscored by the corps commander Karachi’s high-profile visit to the force’s headquarters in the city and his appreciation of its actions just three days after a Rangers’ contingent raided the Sindh Building Control Authority’s offices.

For a provincial dispensation that along with its erstwhile partner in government, the MQM, increasingly perceives the Rangers’ actions as being carried out with overtly political, security establishment-approved objectives — with some justification, we might add — the SBCA raid was the last straw.

It provoked the normally restrained Asif Zardari to lash out against the military, and prompted the chief minister to accuse the Rangers of overstepping their mandate. Strictly speaking, Mr Shah is not far off the mark.

Read more: Altaf asks CM, Sindh Assembly to 'send back oppressive Rangers'

Corruption of the kind that the paramilitary force has now turned its attention to falls more in the domain of white-collar crime, and while the latter may have an undesirable knock-on effect it cannot in itself be defined as terrorism.

And it was to act against terrorism in Karachi that the Rangers’ powers were enhanced.

That said, it does not mean that corruption in high places and abuse of power should not be investigated and prosecuted.

The Sindh government — even in a country where patronage-based politics is the norm — is largely seen as the most brazenly self-serving and corrupt of the provincial dispensations.

The corollary to this is a thoroughly politicised police force that has been fashioned to serve the rulers rather than the ruled.

The question, therefore, is who is going to undertake the cleaning of the stables? There is good reason why the Sindh government’s tribulations are being met by the public with either indifference or outright support for the Rangers’ actions.

It is thus that the politicians compromise themselves, and undermine democracy in the process.

Read more: Altaf wants referendum to gauge support for Rangers operation

Published in Dawn, July 10th, 2015

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