As Pakistan emerged from the shadows of military rule, dismembered and disenchanted, democratic governance and progressive politics promised a better future for the masses. The adoption of Pakistan’s first constitution by an elected assembly in 1973 added to the optimism for constitutionalism and rule of law. This optimism was quickly dispelled as the elected government of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (1970–76) proved itself to be as authoritarian as its predecessors and very much within the mould of postcolonial governance. The courts, which attempted to rely on the new constitution to protect fundamental liberties and provide a voice to the opposition, were soon undermined by constitutional amendments designed to curtail judicial review. Chapter 4 describes this failure of formal democratic constitutionalism in the face of an elective dictatorship. It also charts how, nonetheless, the superior courts insisted on minimal procedural safeguards against the enforcement of state security and public order laws and pushed the envelope of the judicial review of executive action.

Chapter 3 charts the consolidation of judicial review during the first period of direct and indirect martial rule under the Ayub regime (1958–1968). Despite the military–bureaucratic authoritarianism of the Ayub era and the judicial validation of Martial Law, the courts managed to preserve the judicial review of bureaucratic action. The exercise of the Writ jurisdiction aligned with the priorities of a Martial Law regime that was attempting to subdue and co-opt a hitherto powerful bureaucracy. In the post-Martial Law phase, the promulgation of the 1962 Constitution provided the courts with the basis to consolidate the foundations of the Writ jurisdiction along three axes – formal constitutionalism, administrative law and procedural safeguards against the abuse of public order and state security laws – which have remained at the core of the superior courts’ definition of rule of law in the decades since.

The Bengal delta now became part of Pakistan, a uniquely complex post-colonial state: founded upon religious nationalism; administering two discrete territories, separated from each other by about 1,500 km of Indian terrain; and not heir to any of the colony’s central state institutions. Tensions between West and East Pakistan immediately surfaced. East Pakistani grievances crystallised around the question of the national language (Urdu or Bengali), leading to the language movement. After a decade the army stepped in, establishing a military dictatorship that would dominate the remaining years of ‘united Pakistan’.

The Pakistan period saw the emergence of a new ‘vernacular’ elite in East Pakistan. They differed consciously from the ways of the Kolkata-based urban professionals who had dominated colonial Bengali culture, as well as from the ways of the new West Pakistani leaders. These leaders found it impossible to win rural hearts and minds. The vernacular elite, on the other hand, could use their personal and cultural links much more effectively to mobilise the rural population for their vision of cultural renewal, political autonomy and social development.

In the 1960s the unpopular military dictatorship was challenged by a political party (Awami League), and its leader (Sheikh Mujibur Rahman) gained mass popular support. The first general assembly elections in Pakistan resulted in a landslide victory, giving the Awami League an absolute majority in the all-Pakistan assembly. Politicians and army men from West Pakistan refused to hand over the reins of the state, as East Pakistan spinned out of control. A violent confrontation had become inevitable.

In 1947 British rule came to an end and Bengal was split into an eastern half that became East Pakistan and a western part that fell to India. Delineation of the new border, and demarcating it, would turn out to be a long-drawn-out process. One of the unintended consequences of Partition was mass migration across the new borders.

During the Pakistan period (1947–1971), East Pakistan remained an overwhelmingly rural society. National economic policies discriminated against East Pakistan. Rural crowding was a serious issue, especially since poverty had not decreased. By 1971 there were many more East Pakistanis who lived in poverty than in 1947. Life expectancy at birth had improved somewhat but still stood at below fifty years. In terms of improving the quality of life, the Pakistan experiment had been a disappointment to most citizens.