The Invisible Victims of Pakistan’s Justice ...

Summary

• It should not be how many cameras were installed but whether crime actually declined in the places where they were installed.
• A scientifically designed survey, beginning with representative studies in Karachi and rural Sindh and eventually covering the country, could ask people whether they have experienced crime, whether they reported it, why they did or did not report it, how the police responded, how safe they feel and how much confidence they have in the justice system.
• More complaints are not necessarily evidence that crime has increased; they may indicate that citizens have become more willing to report it.

AI Generated Summary

By Shabir Ahmed Chandio

Pakistan has become increasingly good at counting the activity of its criminal-justice system. We count arrests, FIRs, raids, prosecutions, prison admissions, new laws and cameras installed on streets. What we rarely count with the same seriousness is whether people are actually safer, whether investigations are becoming better, whether victims trust the police, whether courts deliver justice within a reasonable time, or whether people released from prison are less likely to commit another offence.

This distinction matters because activity is not the same thing as success. A government can announce thousands of arrests without reducing victimisation. A police department can register more cases without becoming better at investigating them. A city can install an impressive network of cameras without making its streets meaningfully safer. We often mistake what the state does for what the citizen experiences.
Anyone who has spent a morning outside a sessions court in Sindh has probably seen her. She arrives before the courtroom opens, her chadar drawn over her head, a plastic bag of roti beside her. Her son was arrested months ago. She does not fully understand the charge. By afternoon, a clerk tells her that the hearing has been adjourned. She ties the bag shut and goes home.Next month, she will return.She appears in no crime statistic. Her son does — as an arrest. That small scene captures something that national crime figures often fail to show: criminal justice is ultimately experienced by people, not institutions. The mother does not care how many arrests the police department announced that month. She wants to know why her son is still waiting, whether the investigation is lawful, whether the evidence is reliable and when the case will actually be decided.
Pakistan’s criminal-justice debate therefore needs to move away from the language of institutional activity and towards the language of outcomes. The most important question should not be how many people were arrested but whether fewer people became victims. It should not be how many cameras were installed but whether crime actually declined in the places where they were installed. It should not be how many prisoners entered the system but whether the system eventually made society safer.
One reason this is difficult is that the official crime figure is never the whole crime figure. Police statistics tell us what was reported and registered. They cannot automatically tell us what victims decided not to report. Fear, stigma, distrust, financial costs, pressure from families or communities, or the belief that nothing will happen after an FIR can all keep crimes outside the official record. Criminology has long recognised this as the dark figure of crime.
This means that even a decline in reported crime needs interpretation. It may indicate that fewer crimes are taking place. It may also indicate that fewer victims are reporting them. Conversely, a rise in reported crime may sometimes reflect better reporting or improved police registration rather than an actual increase in victimization. Pakistan needs to confront this problem directly through regular national victimisation surveys. A scientifically designed survey, beginning with representative studies in Karachi and rural Sindh and eventually covering the country, could ask people whether they have experienced crime, whether they reported it, why they did or did not report it, how the police responded, how safe they feel and how much confidence they have in the justice system.
Such a survey would not replace police statistics. It would test them. Without that second lens, the official number can improve while the street does not.