In the narrow corridors of a district administration office in Sindh, a meeting convenes under the heading “District Peace Committee.” The chairs are filled with men — mostly clerics, some traders and few local elders. Women are absent. Absent, too, are minorities, except in rare cases. There’s no official charter, no rulebook on the table and no law backing their authority. Yet, the minutes will describe the gathering as an effort at “interfaith harmony” and “public peacekeeping.”

Across Pakistan, such district peace committees (DPCs) operate similarly — ad hoc, inconsistent and undocumented in any statute. They are formed by home department notifications, their powers undefined and their legitimacy uncertain.

What began as a tool for local conflict resolution — first proposed in the wake of the stand-off between the administration of Islamabad’s Lal Masjid and the government over the demolition of several mosques built illegally on government land, which ended in a bloody operation — has ossified into ceremonial bodies, more symbolic than functional.

“The absence of a formal legal framework leaves DPCs in a constant state of flux,” says Maria Sario, who is the focal person for DPC Hyderabad. “Without statutory recognition, our capacity to enforce decisions, ensure continuity or hold members accountable is severely limited,” she tells Eos. “This ambiguity affects not only public trust, but also inter-agency coordination,” she adds.

Without laws to define their powers, most of Pakistan’s district peace committees are little more than symbolic and performative. Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa offers a guiding model for making them more effective…

A Legal Lacuna with Constitutional Consequences

The Legal Aid Society’s 2023 report, ‘Peace Without Protection’, lays bare the data: 75 percent of surveyed DPCs had no formal terms of reference. Coordination with the police was described as sporadic.

This legal vacuum is more than a bureaucratic oversight. It’s a constitutional blind spot. Without legislative codification, DPCs remain outside the protection of law, their decisions vulnerable to being overturned, ignored or politically co-opted. They function in a legal grey zone, where accountability is optional and consistency elusive.

The gap is especially striking when contrasted with the state’s own promises. The National Action Plan (2015) called for district-level peace initiatives. The National Internal Security Policies, of both 2014 and 2018–2023, reiterated this mandate. Yet, a decade on, DPCs continue to exist solely through administrative fiat.

Judicial precedent reinforces this call. In a suo motu case of 2014 (Pakistan Legal Decisions, Supreme Court 699), the country’s apex court, reacting to violent attacks on minorities, explicitly directed the state to establish district-level peace committees across Pakistan. This was reaffirmed in the civil miscellaneous application (CMA) of 2018, regarding an attack on a temple in Punjab, urging provincial compliance in line with national security frameworks.

These rulings are not mere judicial observations; they constitute a jurisprudential imperative: peace mechanisms must not only exist, they must exist within the law.

In Bhong, Punjab, following an attack on a place of worship in 2021, local clerics reported that law enforcement responded unilaterally, bypassing the district committee altogether. In Rahim Yar Khan, a request by a DPC member for an emergency meeting to address communal tensions was reportedly disregarded, with district officials asserting — contrary to on-ground realities—that the committee was “fully functional.”

These are not isolated lapses. A 2023 report by the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan identified political interference and representational imbalance as structural limitations within many such committees.

The Constitution’s Unused Tools

Pakistan’s Constitution offers clear legislative pathways. Article 142(c) empowers provincial assemblies to legislate on matters not in the federal domain — which includes community-level peace mechanisms. Similarly, Article 139 authorises provincial governments to issue statutory rules for the transaction of business, enabling home departments to formally gazette operating procedures for DPCs.

These routes exist within the constitutional framework. What remains missing is the political resolve to act.

The governance gap is mirrored by a representation gap. According to the report ‘Peace Without Protection’, just 37 percent of DPCs in Sindh included a member from any religious minority. Except for Hyderabad and Sukkur, none included women.

These omissions point to systemic exclusion in spaces meant to foster communal peace. Article 25 guarantees equality before the law. Article 20 protects religious freedom. Article 36 commits the state to safeguard minority rights. Without inclusive legal mandates, these constitutional promises ring hollow.

“Promoting public awareness is fundamental to the success of district peace committees,” says Rukhsana Parveen Khokhar, who is the senior manager at the Sindh Legal Advisory Call Centre in Karachi. “Through sustained outreach, inclusive consultations and awareness campaigns, we can build trust, encourage active participation, and instil a shared sense of responsibility for peace and justice,” she tells Eos. “True empowerment begins when people feel heard and represented,” adds Khokhar.

Functionally, many DPCs serve a limited ceremonial role: overseeing religious processions or issuing peace appeals during festivals. Their role in meaningful conflict resolution or trust-building is minimal — a direct result of lacking legal clarity and statutory power.

A Working Model in KP

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) offers a legal alternative. The province has established dispute resolution councils (DRCs) under the KP Police Act, with codified mandates, community oversight and procedural legitimacy.

According to a 2021 United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) evaluation, ‘Supporting Rule of Law for Peaceful, Just and Inclusive Societies in Pakistan (Amn-o-Insaf)’, the DRCs resolved a massive number of local disputes, reduced court backlogs and increased community trust in justice institutions. These councils demonstrate what DPCs could become — if anchored in law.

The Sindh Human Rights Commission’s 2023 working paper, developed after a multi-stakeholder dialogue involving the provincial law minister, highlights the same concern: DPCs lack legal credibility due to their informal status. Its recommendations — legalisation, redefined terms of reference, and gender and minority quotas — reflect a cross-sector consensus.

Maintaining the status quo means accepting legal ambiguity, operational inconsistency and systemic exclusion. Yet, codifying peace doesn’t require reinvention. It simply requires enactment — a District Peace Committees Act, or rules issued under existing provincial powers, to define structure, membership, mandate and accountability.

Legalisation isn’t just a policy upgrade. It is a constitutional obligation. It would bring form to what is now formless, purpose to what is now performative. Most of all, it would give Pakistan’s most local peacebuilders the dignity — and the protection — of law.

The writer is an advocate of the high courts and a member of the District Peace Committee, Hyderabad. He can be contacted at dasoomro@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, EOS, July 20th, 2025