Throughout a current dialog with a gaggle of newly recruited civil servants in Pakistan’s rising port metropolis of Gwadar, the Corps Commander of Balochistan, Lt. Basic Rahat Nadeem Ahmed Khan, the province’s highest-ranking navy official, requested concerning the components driving younger, educated girls towards militancy.
In the identical dialogue, he briefly talked about outstanding Baloch rights activists, together with Dr. Mahrang Baloch and Sammi Deen Baloch, each of whom are girls. In keeping with these acquainted with the trade, Khan stated Sammi Deen’s activism is comparatively reasonable, acknowledging her acknowledged dedication to addressing the problem of Baloch lacking individuals throughout the framework of Pakistan’s Structure. Regardless of this admission by a high navy official, her title stays on the nation’s home anti-terrorism watch listing, regionally referred to as the Fourth Schedule, for over six months.
Khan was extra crucial of Dr. Mahrang Baloch. He referred to as her extra radical, whereas in the identical breath, he expressed some hope that she could have modified in jail, the place she has been since March 2025. He referenced her current op-ed in The Guardian, wherein Dr. Baloch wrote that the Baloch Yakjehti Committee (BYC), the civil rights motion she leads, has remained firmly inside Pakistan’s constitutional framework and is dedicated to resisting human rights violations by way of peaceable political means. In the identical op-ed, Dr. Baloch reiterated that she has persistently condemned all violence in Balochistan and any group that harms harmless individuals.
The corps commander later gave a presentation wherein he talked about my title and framed me as a nationwide safety risk.
Later, I used to be requested the identical query that Khan had raised by some who had been a part of that dialog: what’s driving younger, educated Baloch girls towards militancy?
My brief reply is that this: the first driver behind this pattern is oppressive state coverage, applied by the navy in Balochistan by way of its proxies. A extra detailed clarification factors to the disconnect between extraordinary Baloch individuals and policymakers, particularly these in Punjab and Islamabad, which has created a harmful communication hole. The remedy of crucial voices – political dissidents similar to Mahrang Baloch and Sammi Deen, in addition to rights activists and journalists – as nationwide safety threats has additional intensified the issue.
For years, the navy has tried to manage Balochistan by way of handpicked politicians, typically described regionally as “synthetic leaders,” “conflict beneficiaries,” or “proxies of the navy.” They’ve all the time misled energy brokers in Punjab and senior navy officers concerning the province’s floor realities.
You will need to notice that almost all of navy officers come from Punjab, that means they’ve restricted understanding of Balochistan’s long-standing grievances and its contentious relationship with the state of Pakistan since 1948. Balochistan has seen 4 insurgencies prior to now; the present one is the fifth and longest, and it represents a continuation of earlier cycles of unrest. The province’s synthetic management, nonetheless, has persistently framed the insurgency as purely foreign-driven.
In recent times, this management has routinely labeled crucial Baloch voices as sympathizers of armed teams, anti-Pakistan parts, or proxies of hostile businesses, and sometimes silenced them by way of bans, crackdowns, or imprisonment. For instance, since March 2025, Dr. Mahrang Baloch has remained behind bars on what many take into account weak terrorism-related expenses.
The communication hole between Balochistan and Punjab widened after the controversial 2018 common elections, when the navy institution created the Balochistan Awami Occasion (BAP) in a single day and introduced it to energy.
These politicians lacked public legitimacy and remained disconnected from the actual points dealing with the individuals. As a substitute, they targeted on accumulating wealth by way of corruption and misuse of energy, typically within the title of patriotism. It was throughout this era that the insurgency took a extra violent flip, and the potential for significant negotiations with disgruntled Baloch youth started to shrink, pushing extra younger individuals towards militancy.
The same, much more troubling, sample emerged through the 2024 common elections. The elections had been broadly rigged. The present chief minister of Balochistan, Sarfaraz Ahmed Bugti, was then a part of the caretaker authorities chargeable for guaranteeing free and honest elections, however resigned simply weeks earlier than the vote, apparently violating Article 224(1B) of Pakistan’s Structure, which bars caretaker officers from contesting elections. Regardless of this, he ran and received the election to turn out to be chief minister.
As soon as in workplace, he has used important state assets to focus on Baloch rights activists, the BYC, Baloch nationalist events, and journalists, branding them as anti-state, militant sympathizers, or brokers of hostile businesses. Hundreds of critics have been arrested, disappeared, or added to the Fourth Schedule. He has additionally invested in shaping narratives by inviting journalists and influencers from Punjab and Islamabad to depict Baloch activists as anti-state. Though the chief minister of Balochistan, his messaging appears aimed primarily at audiences in Punjab.
Since 2018, and particularly after the disputed 2024 elections, political illustration in Balochistan has fully misplaced credibility among the many Baloch inhabitants. These in energy are broadly seen as disconnected from the native inhabitants and depending on Punjab for political survival. Because of this, they typically resort to provocative rhetoric towards native activists and human rights defenders, generally intentionally fueling tensions to take care of relevance within the eyes of energy brokers in Punjab and Islamabad. This sample is obvious within the conduct of the present ruling elite.
In response, extra acutely aware youth, notably younger girls, are being drawn towards armed teams. This pattern has intensified after the arrest of Dr. Baloch, a pacesetter of a big peaceable motion, who faces a number of expenses regardless of advocating nonviolent resistance.
The linguistic, cultural, political, and psychological hole between extraordinary Baloch individuals and energy facilities in Islamabad and Punjab has additional allowed provincial elites to mislead decision-makers, lots of whom have restricted engagement with Balochistan’s social material. Whereas such divisions exist throughout Pakistan, in Balochistan, they’re difficult by restricted illustration within the Nationwide Meeting. The province has fewer seats than main cities like Karachi or Lahore, making it much less influential and fewer engaging to mainstream political events similar to Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
Balochistan’s structural isolation additional deepens the issue. The province lacks large-scale business, well-established universities that appeal to college students from different provinces, and a functioning tourism sector. Because of this, policymakers and the city center class in Pakistan have a restricted understanding of Baloch grievances, social realities, and historic tensions with the state.
This info vacuum has enabled the unfold of simplified narratives that attribute unrest primarily to international interference, an evidence readily accepted by these with little direct engagement with Baloch society. Few acknowledge that Baloch grievances date again to 1948 and that the present insurgency is a continuation of earlier insurgencies.
Moreover, inflammatory and derogatory rhetoric towards Baloch rights activists by political figures similar to Sarfaraz Bugti and former caretaker Prime Minister Anwar-ul-Haq Kakar has contributed to the issue. By utilizing state-backed platforms to painting activists as hostile or anti-Pakistan, they’ve alienated Baloch youth and inadvertently pushed extra youth towards militancy.
Balochistan’s present unstable safety scenario will not be solely the results of neglect, deprivation, and repression, but in addition of the persistent focusing on and delegitimization of Baloch voices. In 2025, Pakistan ranked first on the World Terrorism Index, with a 6 p.c enhance in terrorism-related deaths (1,139), and Balochistan was among the many most affected provinces. In 2024, assaults by Baloch insurgents rose by 119 p.c, with the Baloch Liberation Military rising as a significant perpetrator. This escalation has coincided with the rise of the present political management in Balochistan.
Tensions between the Baloch and the state intensified when the households of lacking individuals held a sit-in protest in Islamabad between December 2023 and January 2024. On the time, Kakar was serving as caretaker prime minister. The federal government responded with a vile media marketing campaign and ordered police to make use of power towards protesters. Subsequent developments, together with the mistreatment of protesters in Gwadar in July 2024, the arrest of Dr. Baloch in March 2025, and continued inciting language by high authorities officers, have deepened resentment amongst Baloch youth. This rising frustration is a key issue driving youthful, educated girls towards militancy.
If Lt. Basic Khan really seeks solutions and options, he should transfer past questioning individuals’s patriotism and seeing crucial voices as a nationwide safety risk. The true place to begin for enhancing the safety scenario within the province is a elementary, long-term reassessment of state coverage in Balochistan.
On the coronary heart of the disaster lies a collapse of political legitimacy and belief. Rebuilding this requires ending enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings, releasing outstanding jailed Baloch rights activists as a substitute of viewing them as nationwide safety threats, and changing the present provincial setup with genuinely consultant management.
With out credible political illustration, no security-driven strategy can carry peace or cease girls (and males) from becoming a member of armed teams.
