The white Suzuki van, remarkable only for its military licence plates, pulled up outside Gate 2 of army headquarters in Rawalpindi—the complex of buildings that houses not just the army chief, but the country’s top nuclear-weapons officials, including the director-general of the Strategic Plans Division and the director-general of Strategic Forces Command. The Tehreek-e-Taliban jihadists took hostages from among base staff, and forced an extended battle with troops, which claimed the lives of twelve soldiers.

Earlier this week, the gate of that citadel was breached again—but this time by hundreds of enraged Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) supporters, some from military families, protesting the arrest of former prime minister Imran Khan on corruption charges. The army had—wisely—pulled its guards back, avoiding bloodshed some feared could divide its own ranks.

From inside the burning home of the Lahore corps commander came ceremonial cannons, boxes of frozen strawberries, and even the exquisite albino peacocks that graced his lawns: “These were bought with the people’s money,” one protestor asserted, “we’re just taken back what was stolen from us.”

Imran might seem an unlikely icon for an explosion of proletarian rage: He is, after all, alleged to have helped himself to expensive gifts as well as state lands, and cultivated cronies one of whom flashes $100,000 handbags. The fact is, however, that for the first time in Pakistan’s history, action against a political leader has inspired an impromptu mini-intifada against the military itself.

To understand just what has led to this dramatic confrontation—and the deep consequences it could have for the country—it’s necessary to put Imran’s unprecedented defiance of the Army in context.

The old new Medina

For all its iconic surrealism, Imran’s politics represents a long political heritage: The religious Right-wing positioned itself as the pole of political resistance to the élitism of the post-colonial State. The Objectives Resolution of 1949, which committed Pakistan to seek the construction of a theocratic State, was the first victory of the Right. The religious Right forced religious clauses into the 1956 constitution and compelled military ruler General Ayub Khan to restore the words ‘Islamic Republic’……


To read more: https://theprint.in/opinion/security-code/more-than-imran-its-jihadist-influence-on-pakistan-army-thats-gen-asim-munirs-headache/1566979/