LAST month the Karachi Police uncovered a series of unreported deaths of young girls. After investigation, it came to light that the girls were at a party in a farmhouse in the outskirts of the city where they were exposed to drug overuse which caused their deaths and in a mysterious manner they were buried within the walls of the farmhouse. Who was giving these girls an overdose of drugs? Many questions related to the murders are still unanswered and it is hoped that the police is carrying on a serious investigation into the root cause of the crime.
Drug addiction in Pakistan is a very serious and disturbing problem that can no longer be placed at a back bench by the government and policy makers. A look at the statistics, which are a conservative reading, is mind boggling. According to the United Nations report released in October 2022, 7.6 million people in Pakistan were addicted to drugs with the majority being males.
The rising trend of drug use, especially ICE, has been playing havoc with the lives of young children and youth. Usually in the context of Pakistan, most societal issues largely impact only the poor people and the rich strata of society stays well protected within its bubble, however, drug addiction amongst children has seeped into rich private educational institutions and universities in the same way as it has engulfed the poor street children of Pakistan. No child or young adult is protected from this menace. The entire next generation of the country is exposed to a danger the magnitude of which is alarming.
A quick look at facts and figures reveals the scale of the problem across the provinces and the capital. The Zhob route in Balochistan has been identified as one of the principal drug trafficking highways in South Asia. It is a well known fact that Afghanistan produces 90% of the world’s opium, most of which is smuggled through the rugged terrain of Balochistan to many countries across the world. Thus making drugs easily available in Balochistan and leading to an outrageous addiction in its already primitive and economically unstable society. Similarly, in KP, which has a host of socio-economic infrastructure issues and poverty concerns within its society, drug abuse has spread like a wildfire to numb the senses of people most underprivileged.
In the city of lights, Karachi, the drug addiction and overuse has become a commonplace problem in schools and neighbourhoods, however, the homeless children are most exposed to this danger. The US State Department’s 2022 TIP Report reveals that there are around 1.5million homeless children in Pakistan with a third of those in Sindh province and traffickers force such children to take drugs and exploit the drug addiction to keep them in sex trafficking and forced work/services like begging etc.
Lastly, inside the Federal Capital which is often seen as the safest place in Pakistan according to the report of a renowned NGO, 53% of students of leading private schools in Islamabad are addicted to drugs. That’s more than half of the school going population in the capital. Another survey said that one of every 10 university students is addicted to drugs and almost 50% of the students of educational institutions are addicted to drugs.
The above facts and figures present merely a glimpse of the iceberg. The problem is now deep-rooted and eating away at the foundations of the society, ruining the future generations. It is another topic altogether to understand the different branches of this issue, which are no less disturbing. Drug overuse/addiction leads frequently to sex offences, sexual exploitation, cyber crime, disease and the spread of HIV/AIDS; leads to crimes under the use of substance and various other offences. A recent and horrifying example was the incident of drug abuse and sexual offences against numerous young university girls at the Islamia University in Bahawalpur. The root cause was drug abuse and the lack of accountability under the anti-narcotics laws of Pakistan.
What are the anti-narcotics laws and policing mechanism? It is first and foremost important to understand exactly how the law and policy need to function and it’s secondary to question whether those functional requirements are being fulfilled. As parents and responsible citizens of Pakistan, we need that the law should place prohibitions on the production, sale, trafficking, usage and laundered crime proceeds of narcotics across the country. If the law fails to carry out any of these functions, the situation will not change. Policing has to be thorough to combat from the level of production to the supply chain and those involved in it.
Pakistan is a signatory to the relevant international conventions (Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961) and it promulgated domestic legislation on the subject in 1997. The Anti-Narcotics Force Act 1997 and Control of Narcotics Substances Act 1997 (CNSA) were later amended in 2022. These laws provide a procedural and administrative framework to control the usage of narcotics substances but enforcement is essentially the task of the Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) and provincially this is handled by the provincial forces. It is worth emphasizing that the amended CNSA 2022 obliges courts to impose maximum punishment in cases where the narcotics are sold in or near educational institutions.
The amendment has broadened the definition of narcotics to include ICE and gives the executive the power to modify the list of prohibited drugs. While the law is sufficient, the problem persists due to inadequate enforcement. Pakistan must engage internationally with donors and agencies to form partnerships for tackling this issue through global cooperation. At the local level, improving coordination between provincial and federal governments is essential to establish a uniform nationwide system, especially for safeguarding children on the streets and in educational institutions. The Anti-Narcotics Force (ANF) plays a crucial role in apprehending offenders under the CNSA, and the judiciary is responsible for expediting trials and imposing strict sentences.
—The writer is a Legal Expert and has served as Senior Advisor Legal to the Federal Ombudsman and Legal Advisor to the UKAID, UN & ICRC.
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