Pakistan's 79th: time to live, not just survive
As Pakistan marks its 79th Independence Day, it is worth pausing to recall that the country was born of a civilian movement. Our forefathers secured a homeland through political struggle, not conquest. The real question is whether we have learnt to live in it.
Lao Tzu's counsel still applies: stop waiting for the right moment. Start living, and the momentum will create the progress. From the beginning, Pakistan drifted into a survival posture. Cold War pressures, regional tensions and the habits of colonial administration combined to prioritise security above all else. Systems were built to protect the state rather than to enable ordinary life. The result is a society that has become skilled at enduring but remains uncertain about flourishing.
Recent years have brought macroeconomic recovery and a measure of political stability. That is necessary but not sufficient. A country cannot wait for perfect growth numbers before it begins to make daily life livable. Four practical steps can start that shift immediately.
Empower local governments
Provinces received Rs9.2 trillion in federal transfers in FY2026. Only Rs1.8 trillion of that was expected to reach local governments, according to the Economic Policy & Business Development assessment. The gap is telling.
Pakistan lost a large part of its territory in 1971 partly because power was not shared. The 18th Amendment in 2010 finally devolved authority to provinces. Those same provinces now often resist further devolution to the tier closest to citizens. Local bodies remain the weakest link in service delivery. Without financial resources and authority at the municipal level, basic governing services will stay distant from the people who need them most.
Leverage remittances for the south also
Remittances have become one of Pakistan's most reliable economic pillars, crossing $41.6 billion in the last fiscal year. The inflows are heavily concentrated in the north. Punjab, Kashmir and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa capture the bulk; Sindh and Balochistan receive far less.
This is a policy failure, not destiny. Governments in the south have not built the networks, facilitation or awareness that turn migration into a steady income stream for ordinary households. Unlike industrialisation drives that have repeatedly fallen short, remittances put money directly into people's pockets. If Sindh and Balochistan could mobilise even a quarter of the northern performance, an additional $10 billion would reach communities facing poverty, weak infrastructure and, in Balochistan's case, long-running insecurity. Karachi, often called the country's economic engine, still contains large slums, which breed generational poverty. These households need practical pathways to the same remittance channels that have lifted living standards elsewhere.
Transport policy should follow the same logic. The conversation should centre on buses, trucks and light commercial vehicles that keep the economic wheel turning, not on private cars, which are one of the biggest causes of emissions and we cannot afford anyway. Even wealthier nations now prioritise walking paths and cycle tracks for health and environmental reasons. These are achievable goals for ordinary Pakistanis as well.
Build civic sense from the ground up
A society that cannot keep its streets functional or its traffic orderly will struggle to deliver larger reforms. Civic sense is not a luxury. It is the daily practice of making life easier for one another.
Simple habits matter: wearing clean clothes, treating a cup of tea as something to be enjoyed, observing basic manners. Traffic rules are the most visible test. When they are ignored, everyone pays in time, safety and frustration.
Other societies teach these habits early. Japanese schools train children to clean their own classrooms. In London, you will see a common sight of dog owners picking up their pets' waste with a plastic bag; it is a disgusting sight from the perspective of this part of the world, and they dispose of it properly because bins are placed every few hundred metres. In Karachi, however, a person can walk long distances without finding a single public bin. The difference is not culture alone; it is the partnership between local governments and citizens.
Schools remain the natural starting point. Despite significant public spending on teachers, consistent delivery of even basic civic education has proved elusive. Empowered local governments and functioning schools are the practical route to change.
Restore a working sense of justice
No amount of moral preaching will create legitimacy while the elite continue to enjoy exceptional protections and ordinary citizens face arbitrary power. When individuals can appropriate public resources, silence critics or make people disappear without consequence, the social contract frays.
Pakistan is not a society which believes in China's rigidity or America's free-for-all. So, we need a middle path in which the law applies with reasonable consistency. Absolute justice is impossible in any society. Relative, accessible justice is not. A state known for its ability to act decisively against individuals perceived as threats, making them missing persons when they speak against the establishment, should be equally capable of protecting citizens from abuse of power.
Those who hold concentrated authority will eventually have to share it. History shows that no concentration of power lasts forever. A society becomes respected on the global stage only when the majority of its people are able to live with dignity at home. Keeping large sections of the population in poverty, while a minority controls resources is not a path to national standing.
The country was not created by military victory. It was the product of political will and civilian organisation. Returning to that original impulse requires strengthening every institution, not only those responsible for security. It also requires investing in the human resources that make those institutions work.
On its 79th Independence Day, Pakistan does not need another grand plan. It needs to stop postponing ordinary life. Empower the local tier, open remittance channels in the south, teach civic habits, and make justice less selective. The rest will follow from the momentum of people who are finally allowed to live.
The writer is a staff correspondent