IN the fraught times we are living in, there is much that can be read between the lines of even an offhand greeting. PTI Chairman Imran Khan’s summoning to the Supreme Court on Thursday was anything but ordinary.

The government, correctly sensing that the former prime minister was about to walk, had gone on the offensive from the moment national media reported that the country’s top court had demanded that Mr Khan be produced before it by NAB within the hour.

While the PDM leaders were still throwing barbs at the highest court of the land, the chief justice’s nonchalant greeting to Mr Khan on his arrival in court was splashed on TV screens nationwide. “Nice to see you,” he said.

The troubling spectacle of the PTI chief’s arrest may have momentarily distracted attention from the fact that there is a fourth player in the ongoing tussle over ‘supremacy’ within the corridors of power.

Yesterday’s events saw it saunter right back into the limelight. That the two phone-call recordings were ‘leaked’ to the media shortly after Mr Khan’s Tuesday arrest were deemed illegal by the Supreme Court indicated, among other things, the frustration of certain quarters. ‘Match fixed’, the caption to one screamed.

Whoever has been illegally snooping into the private conversations of Pakistani VIPs was clearly quite miffed. The army’s senior command had earlier made it clear that PTI sympathisers’ decidedly discourteous behaviour towards their institution following Mr Khan’s arrest would be considered a ‘dark chapter’ in Pakistan’s history.

The Supreme Court, it seemed, couldn’t care less. Although technically it simply upheld what has long been held to be principle, it was difficult to ignore the complaints of the decision being the ‘fastest-ever relief’ granted to an embattled former prime minister.

Pictures of a smiling Mr Khan, snapped once with fist raised in what seemed to be a gesture of victory, and again with a hand pressed against his heart, seemed more than a little odd after the images of general mayhem that had haunted television screens for the two preceding days.

The country now seems primed for a progressively ugly showdown in the days and weeks to come. None of the leaders, political or institutional, who are invested in this tug-of-war appear ready to take a step back.

If anything, they seem prepared to climb two steps up the escalation ladder. Mr Khan’s insistence on pointing fingers even after securing bail from the Islamabad High Court yesterday does not bode well.

‘The gloves are off’ seems to be a tired cliché at this point. One prays we never reach the ‘daggers drawn’ stage. There is an immediate need to defuse the prevailing tensions at this point. The country cannot bear the stress much longer.

Published in Dawn, May 13th, 2023