Gujrat: The Height of the Akbari Fort and the Trag…

By Tahseen Ullah  For millions of Pakistanis, migration is a journey of hope and opportunity. Its success depends not simply on departure, but on informed decisions, relevant skills, ethical recruitment and proper preparation. Labour migration is a continuum—from reliable information and guidance, authentic career planning through skills development, documentation, overseas employment, work-visa processing, registration and Pre departure orientation at Protectorate of Emigrants, worker protection, and return and reintegration. For Pakistan, strengthening every stage of this cycle is essential to making labour mobility safe, regular, skills-oriented and rights-based. A well-managed migration system can protect workers, reduce exploitation and irregular migration, enhance employability, and transform migration from a response to unemployment into a strategic investment in human capital, economic resilience and sustainable national growth. The journey begins with one critical step: making an informed decision about whether, where and how to migrate Planning for Informed Migration: Skills, Choices and Readiness The migration journey begins with access to reliable information and informed decisions about overseas labour markets, occupations, wages, destinations, costs, legal pathways and potential risks. Once the decision to migrate is made, preparation should focus on employability and readiness through relevant technical skills, recognised certifications, language proficiency, digital literacy, financial awareness, and knowledge of employment contracts and workers’ rights. Aligning skills and qualifications with the evolving demands of destination-country labour markets can help prospective migrants pursue safe, regular and sustainable employment opportunities. Recruitment, Work Visa and Pre-Departure: Safe Pathways Recruitment is a critical stage of the migration cycle and a key point of vulnerability. Pakistani workers can access overseas employment through licensed Overseas Employment Promoters, the Overseas Employment Corporation, or direct employment. Verified employers, transparent contracts, fair recruitment costs and accessible grievance mechanisms help prevent fraud and exploitation. The process also includes obtaining the required work visa through the relevant diplomatic mission, completing emigration clearance and registration for protection, and attending Pre-Departure Orientation at the Protectorate of Emigrants (PoE) offices, equipping migrants with essential knowledge of their rights, responsibilities, workplace safety and available support services. Post-Arrival: Protection and Productivity The migration journey continues after arrival. Migrants may face contract violations, wage disputes, unsafe working conditions, language barriers, discrimination or limited access to support. Effective labour protection, employer compliance, consular assistance and accessible referral mechanisms are essential. Well-protected migrants are more likely to remain productive and successfully integrate into the workplace. Return and Sustainable Reintegration: Turning Experience into Opportunity Return marks an important transition in the migration cycle, particularly for workers completing their contracts and returning to Pakistan. A planned return and reintegration strategy can help returnees make productive use of their savings, skills, experience and professional networks. Access to psychosocial, legal, financial and employment support, along with skills recognition, entrepreneurship opportunities and further training, can facilitate sustainable reintegration. With the right support, returnees can turn their overseas experience into productive livelihoods and contribute to local economic development. Challenges and Opportunities Pakistan’s migration system faces persistent challenges, including information gaps, fraudulent recruitment, irregular migration, high recruitment costs, low skills levels, limited recognition of qualifications, inadequate protection and weak reintegration mechanisms. Fragmented coordination across institutions can further reduce the effectiveness of the migration process. At the same time, significant opportunities exist. Pakistan’s young population, expanding skills base and growing international demand for workers in healthcare, construction, engineering, IT, caregiving, manufacturing and green sectors provide a strong foundation for expanding regular labour mobility. The opportunity is to move from a labour-export model to a human-capital and talent-mobility model—through demand-driven skills development, international certification, language training, ethical recruitment, stronger bilateral labour mobility agreements and effective protection across the migration cycle. The Way Forward Pakistan’s National Emigration and Welfare Policy 2026 provide a framework for managing migration through a whole-of-cycle approach, covering safe and regular migration, skills development, worker protection, welfare, and return and reintegration. Its success will depend on effective implementation through clear short-, medium- and long-term strategies, strong institutional coordination and measurable outcomes. Relevant organisations, including Migrant Resource Centres, can complement these efforts through awareness-raising, guidance and information on legal pathways, referrals, Pre departure orientation, reintegration of returnees to helping migrants make informed decisions and avoid fraud, exploitation and irregular migration. Going forward, the priority should be to translate policy commitments into practical outcomes for migrants and their families. This requires sustained institutional coordination, responsive services and a system that remains connected to changing labour-market needs and the realities faced by workers throughout the migration journey. If managed effectively, migration can go beyond providing overseas employment and remittances to become a pathway for skills transfer, productive return and improved economic opportunities—contributing to a more resilient and prosperous Pakistan. Tahseen Ullah is a development and migration sector practitioner specializing in labour mobility, migration governance, education and child protection. He can be reached at tahseenanthro@gmail.com  LinkedIn: Tahseen Ullah

After creating man, Allah Almighty included within his nature an administrative structure for the family, whereby he might continue the journey of life according to the needs of his age. With the passage of time this structure was obliged to expand; the family pressed onward and at length arrived at the threshold of the state. In the present family order, while the grandfather yet lives he is acknowledged head of the house, and his permission and consent enter into all the greater affairs thereof. Yet for the practical running of that household he has delegated certain responsibilities and powers to the members of his family, so that each person may be answerable for the work committed to his charge. When this same structure enlarged its scope to the management of the state, successive arrangements were fashioned in the light of varied experience, and the state began to be administered accordingly. In view of the requirements of the present hour further amendments were introduced, and thus the Pakistan Defence Forces Amendment Bill of 2026 was approved by Parliament, that all the affairs of the state might be conducted professionally under their proper jurisdictions. The Act gives effect to certain provisions of the earlier Twenty-Seventh Constitutional Amendment. It establishes a Defence Forces Headquarters under the Chief of Defence Forces—an office held concurrently by the Chief of Army Staff—as the central headquarters of the armed forces. The Chief of Defence Forces is constituted the principal military adviser to the Prime Minister upon questions of national security, defence and the armed forces; he exercises operational command and control of those forces while remaining responsible to the federal government; and he is vested with authority for multi-domain integration, operational cohesion, joint and tri-service coordination, organisation, training, administration, combat readiness and kindred functions. Broad personnel powers are likewise conferred upon him; he may retire, release, accept or reject resignation, discharge, retain in service, or relax the limits of age and length of service for personnel subject to the laws of the armed forces, excluding only those appointed under Article 243, namely the service chiefs themselves. Amendments to the National Command Authority substitute the former office of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee with that of the Chief of Defence Forces. The measures are given retrospective effect from November 27, 2025. These provisions stand partially in line with a global tendency toward unified joint command and a single senior military counsellor. Many countries have created equivalent positions—Chief of Defence Staff, Chief of the Defence Force, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the like—in order to improve jointness, diminish service silos and furnish single-point military advice, lessons drawn from the demands of modern multi-domain warfare. In the United States the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is the highest-ranking officer and principal military adviser to the President, the National Security Council and the Secretary of Defence. By the Goldwater-Nichols reforms and the provisions of Title 10 he possesses no operational command authority over the armed forces or over the other Joint Chiefs; the chain of command runs from the President through the Secretary of Defence to the combatant commanders. His function is deliberately advisory, concerned with counsel, planning, joint doctrine and the transmission of communications, so that civilian control and a measure of service autonomy in operations may be preserved. In India the Chief of Defence Staff serves as principal military adviser to the Defence Minister on tri-service matters, permanent Chairman of the Chiefs of Staff Committee, head of the Department of Military Affairs and military adviser to the Nuclear Command Authority. He is charged with promoting jointness in operations, logistics, training, the prioritisation of procurement and the development of theatre commands. Explicitly, however, he does not exercise operational military command over the service chiefs, who retain command of their respective services; he is described as first among equals. The office was created to enhance integration without subordinating the services in the conduct of operations. In the United Kingdom the Chief of the Defence Staff is the professional head of the Armed Forces and principal military adviser to the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Defence. Historically the role centred upon advice and strategy; reforms of recent years have strengthened it so that the Chief commands the service chiefs and heads a Military Strategic Headquarters charged with force design, war planning and the development of an integrated force. Even so, the office continues to operate under strong ministerial and civilian direction through the Defence Council. Canada, Australia and similar Commonwealth models typically invest the Chief of the Defence Staff or Chief of the Defence Force with command authority over the forces, subject to direction from the government or the minister and ultimate civilian or Crown control. Emphasis is laid upon unified command for both operations and administration, exercised under parliamentary oversight. The global pattern, therefore, moves toward a senior joint office for better integration and counsel. Pakistan’s law shares the goals of jointness, a central headquarters, multi-domain coordination and a principal advisory role, and is in that respect consistent with prevailing trends. Yet the Pakistani model differs in significant particulars. The concurrent dual role, whereby the Chief of Defence Forces is held by the serving Army Chief, is uncommon; most systems either appoint a separate officer, often rotated among the services, or keep the joint head distinct from day-to-day single-service command. This arrangement produces a clearer Army-centred apex than the more balanced or purely advisory models of the United States, India or the earlier British practice. Moreover, the combination of direct operational command and control of all services with sweeping personnel powers—extending to retirement, discharge, retention and the alteration of service limits across the forces, save only the top service chiefs—exceeds the strictly advisory character of the American and Indian systems. It approaches the stronger command-oriented models found in parts of the Commonwealth and in the recent British reforms, yet remains unusually comprehensive in matters of personnel under a single officer. In

To watch Shakarparian today is to mourn a broken promise. Not a fleeting vow, but a masterplan—conceived with purpose, codified on paper, and abandoned by design. I went through archives at Bazar Road, Iqbal Hall G-7, poring over the original master plan drawn up in 1960 by the great Greek architect and city planner Konstantinos Apostolos Doxiadis and his team. It was there that I first understood what Shakarparian was always meant to be. Doxiadis and his fellow planners did not design this triangle-shaped green expanse near Zero Point as an afterthought, a leftover patch of land between roads. They designated it, deliberately and explicitly, as the lungs of Islamabad — a temperature regulator, a natural sound barrier, a groundwater recharge zone, and a protective forest without which the city’s clean air was never meant to exist. This was not sentiment. This was engineering. And we have spent the decades since betraying it. Islamabad in 1961 was home to barely 117,000 people. Today it holds well over 2.4 million. That growth was not an accident — it was, in part, the very success of Doxiadis’s vision: a green, livable, breathable capital that drew people in from across the country and beyond. But success has a cruel irony here, because the same city that grew because of its green lungs has spent decades quietly cutting into them. Between 1961 and 2024, Islamabad’s temperature has already climbed by 5 degrees Celsius, with projections warning of a further 0.7 degrees by 2039 and 2.2 degrees by 2069. This is the urban heat island effect, and it is not an abstraction — it is Doxiadis’s temperature regulator being dismantled, piece by piece, exactly as he warned it must not be. Shakarparian itself covers roughly 1,376 hectares, formally absorbed into the Margalla Hills National Park in 1980, sitting almost at the very heart of the capital — an emerald set into the city’s crown, as it deserves to be called. A biodiversity survey conducted in November 2014 found 155 animal species sheltering within it: 23 species of mammals, 104 species of birds spanning 16 orders and 42 families, 22 species of reptiles, and 6 species of amphibians. The same survey catalogued more than 661 plant species across 28 families, with six distinct dominant vegetation communities knitting the forest floor together. This is not a park. This is a living, breathing ecological archive sitting in the geographic center of a national capital — a rarity almost nowhere else replicated in the world. It was Roedad Khan — the legendary civil servant and statesman — who understood the fragility of this inheritance early enough to act. In 1989 he founded the Margalla Hills Society, and for decades that institution has done more than most government departments to keep the wider Margalla ecosystem intact. But Shakarparian, sitting apart within it, has not been so fortunate. It has instead become a recurring casualty of the very authority meant to protect it — the Capital Development Authority itself. Piece by piece, lease by lease, CDA has allowed Shakarparian’s protective forest cover to be carved away. Look at what now occupies ground that was meant to remain forest: the Parade Ground, the Pak-China Friendship Centre, the Islamabad Club, the Gun and Country Club, Lok Virsa, an open-air theatre, and a string of upscale hotels and restaurants. Each addition was, in its own file, justified. Together, they are a forest reduced to a backdrop for institutions that no longer need it and increasingly cannot coexist with it. This has happened in direct violation of Regulation 4(3)(b) of the ICT Zoning Regulations of Islamabad, which exists for the explicit purpose of preventing exactly this kind of land-use change, allegedly under sustained political pressure. Satellite imagery from Landsat and Sentinel spanning the last twenty years tells the story without need for further commentary: the southwest region of Shakarparian shows a stark, measurable retreat of forest cover. The judiciary, at least once, was willing to look squarely at this. On January 11, 2022, the Islamabad High Court delivered its verdict in Prof. Zahid Baig Mirza versus Capital Development Authority, and the ruling was unambiguous: the shifting of the Parade Ground into Zone 3, the widening of roads through the forest, and the construction of the China Friendship Centre inside Shakarparian all violated the ICT Zoning Regulations. It was, on paper, a vindication of everything Doxiadis intended and everything CDA had ignored. A court verdict that is not enforced, however, is simply another document gathering dust the way the original master plan itself so nearly did. And here I have to say something that will not make me popular in certain circles of this city: the NGO sector stationed in Islamabad has failed Shakarparian as thoroughly as CDA has bulldozed it. The single biggest failure of these organizations is that they will not raise their own voice — they wait, always, for the government to raise it first, as though advocacy requires official permission. That is not activism. That is choreography. Too many of these NGOs are, in practice, family businesses wearing the language of conservation: leadership passed quietly within the same households for years, boards that never rotate, and a business model built not around planting a single tree in Shakarparian but around producing glossy reports, attending conferences, and mastering the art of recycling the same handful of buzzwords — resilience, sustainability, nature-based solutions — into slightly different sentences for slightly different donors. They are experts in rephrasing a crisis. They are not experts in stopping one. When the chainsaws reached the H-8 green belt, it was a lone campaigner and a worried student who spoke up first, not the well-funded organisations whose entire mandate is supposed to be exactly this. This failure is made worse by the fact that the government itself is not short of obligations it has already signed onto. Pakistan is a party to the Convention on Biological Diversity, which binds it to conserve representative ecosystems and halt biodiversity loss

In days of yore, the family stood as the unshakeable foundation of life, its fabric woven with threads of reverence, tenderness, and mutual reliance. The presence of elders within the home was regarded as a divine blessing, their wrinkled brows and measured words carrying the distilled wisdom of decades. They had seen seasons of plenty and seasons of want; their counsel was never hasty, but rooted in experience both sweet and bitter. Matters great and small—marriages, disputes, harvests, or the education of the young—were laid before the family circle. Voices rose and fell in earnest consultation, differences were aired with respect, and decisions emerged strengthened by collective thought. Sharing every joy doubled its brightness; confiding every sorrow lightened its burden. Such openness was not mere habit but a sacred trust, binding hearts as firmly as blood itself. Festivals like Eid shone as luminous expressions of this unity. Homes were cleansed with care, lamps lit, and the air filled with the aroma of special dishes prepared by loving hands. Families gathered in their finest attire, exchanging embraces that spoke louder than any words. Youngsters sought the elders’ blessings, pressing foreheads to hands worn by labour and prayer. Visiting relatives was no burdensome custom but a joyful obligation. One would travel dusty paths or crowded streets to enquire after an ailing uncle, to carry sweets to a widowed aunt, or to offer a strong shoulder in times of grief. To be useful in one another’s sorrows and celebrations was considered not charity but a natural duty, the very pulse of kinship. Then the world shifted. Modernity, with its ceaseless demands and glittering innovations, began to loosen these ancient ties. Technology arrived as a herald of progress, and the internet promised to shrink distances, allowing voices to reach across oceans in an instant. Yet in bridging the far, it often widened the gulf between those who dwelt beneath the same roof. The thoughtful purchase of Eid cards, selected with a discerning eye and inscribed with heartfelt sentiments penned in one’s own hand, has given way to instant messages generated by artificial intelligence—polished, abundant, yet strangely hollow. What once touched the soul now risks becoming mechanical routine. Worse still, we have turned our gaze outward, forgetting the sorrows and joys nearest to us. We scroll endlessly through the lives of strangers, offering likes and comments to people whose names we barely know, while the quiet struggles of our own parents or the silent longings of our children pass unnoticed. We share stirring posts about kindness, patience, and gratitude—words that stir the conscience for a fleeting moment—yet how rarely do we live even a fraction of their wisdom. Our digital connections resemble bubbles upon still water; shimmering, fragile, and empty at the core. They burst without warning, leaving behind only the memory of illusion. Within the walls of many homes today, a poignant scene unfolds. In one modest room, a father pores over his telephone, chasing distant conversations or business affairs. Beside him, the mother engages with images and voices from afar, her gentle smile reserved for the screen. The children, heads bent over glowing devices, laugh at jests from unknown companions or compete for admiration among virtual friends. Though seated within arm’s reach, they inhabit separate worlds. The warmth of real voices, the comfort of a shared glance, the simple pleasure of recounting the day’s small events—these have grown rare. We have learned the art of being present in absence, and absent in presence. The truth, spoken plainly, wounds the heart; we have changed profoundly. We know little of one another now beyond the bare fact that we yet live. The elder’s stories gather dust on forgotten shelves; the family consultation has fallen silent; the spontaneous visit to a relative’s home feels like an inconvenience rather than a delight. Our loved ones, who would stand beside us when fortune smiles or when tempests rage, receive only fragments of our attention. It is they, not the distant crowd, who truly matter. We must therefore resolve to reclaim the substance of life. Let us set aside the screens at certain hours, lift our eyes to those around us, and rediscover the irreplaceable value of real companionship. Let consultation return to the family table, visits become frequent once more, and festivals regain their former glow of devotion. Technology need not be our master; it can serve if we command it with wisdom. Only by nurturing the bonds with those who share our daily bread and our deepest affections can the family fabric regain its former strength and beauty. In such renewal lies our truest happiness, for the heart finds its home not in the applause of multitudes, but in the quiet fidelity of kin.

When France first levied a 3% tax on the domestic revenues of large technology companies in 2019, the move was presented as a modest, temporary fix. Five years later, the temporary fix has become a global patchwork. More than 20 countries now operate some form of digital services tax, the United States has threatened retaliatory tariffs, and the multilateral replacement intended to tidy it all up remains unsigned.   The question at the heart of the scramble is disarmingly simple and technically complex: where should a company that sells everywhere but is physically located almost nowhere pay its taxes?   For most of the last century, international tax rules rested on physical presence. A company was taxed where it had offices, factories, or personnel. That principle struggled as companies like Google, Amazon, and Meta built business models in which value is derived from users, data, and online advertising in one country, while profits are booked in another, often lower-tax, jurisdiction.   The scale of the mismatch sharpened after the 2008 financial crisis. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) launched its Base Erosion and Profit Shifting (BEPS) project in 2013, estimating that profit-shifting cost governments $100 billion to $240 billion annually in lost revenue. By 2018, public pressure to act on highly visible technology firms accelerated political timelines faster than the OECD process could move.   The result was the rise of the unilateral digital services tax, or DST.   Unlike corporate income taxes, DSTs are typically levied on gross revenues, not profits, generated from specific digital activities online marketplaces, search engines, social media platforms, and targeted advertising within a country’s borders. Rates are low, generally 2% to 5%, but they apply broadly. The United Kingdom’s 2% DST raised over £800 million in 2024-25. France, Italy, Spain, Austria, India, Turkey and others adopted similar measures, each with slightly different thresholds, definitions, and scopes.   Proponents argue DSTs restore a basic link between economic activity and taxation. “If a platform earns substantial revenue from French users watching French ads, the French tax base should reflect that,” a senior official at the French Ministry of Finance said in 2023. For many developing economies, where consumption of digital services is large but physical presence of providers is minimal, DSTs are also a matter of fiscal sovereignty.   Critics, including the technology companies themselves and the U.S. government, point to three problems. First, taxing revenue rather than profit can penalize low-margin businesses and be passed on to small businesses and consumers who use the platforms. Second, the proliferation of different rules creates compliance complexity and the risk of double taxation, where the same income is taxed in multiple jurisdictions. Third, Washington has long argued DSTs are discriminatory by design, targeting predominantly American firms.   That third argument carried trade consequences. Under Section 301 of the U.S. Trade Act, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) investigated DSTs adopted by France, India, Italy, and others, concluding that several did discriminate against U.S. companies. Tariffs of up to 25% on selected imports were prepared, then suspended pending a global deal.   That deal was meant to be Pillar One.   In October 2021, 136 countries and jurisdictions representing more than 90% of global GDP agreed to a two-pillar framework brokered by the OECD/G20 Inclusive Framework. Pillar Two, a 15% global minimum corporate tax, has largely moved forward and is now in force in dozens of countries. Pillar One is the more ambitious and more fragile.   Under Pillar One’s Amount A, a portion of the residual profits of the world’s largest and most profitable multinationals  those with global turnover above €20 billion and profitability above 10% would be reallocated to market jurisdictions where their customers and users are located, regardless of physical presence. The scope was deliberately expanded beyond tech; excluding extractive industries and regulated financial services, it would cover roughly 100 multinationals across sectors.   In exchange, countries would be required to withdraw DSTs and similar measures and commit not to introduce new ones. A Multilateral Convention (MLC) would implement the rules, replacing a web of unilateral taxes with a single, coordinated mechanism. The OECD estimated in 2023 that Pillar One would reallocate $200 billion in profits and generate $13 billion to $36 billion in additional global tax revenue annually, a figure comparable in aggregate to existing DST receipts, though distribution would differ markedly by country.   Negotiations have since slowed. The original goal of signing the MLC in 2023 was missed. A target for 2024 was also missed. In 2025 and early 2026, several governments, including the UK, revised their internal planning assumptions to 2027, while confirming that their DSTs “remain in operation” until a convention enters into force.   Several factors explain the delay. The convention requires ratification, including in the United States, where any tax treaty must secure a two-thirds majority in the Senate. Bipartisan skepticism about ceding taxing rights and concerns about revenue impacts have made ratification uncertain. Some emerging economies have argued that the thresholds for Pillar One are too high and the reallocation too small to benefit them meaningfully, preferring instead to retain DSTs or pursue a parallel negotiation at the United Nations on international tax cooperation that could run until 2027. In Washington, meanwhile, successive administrations have maintained that any acceptable deal must include robust DST withdrawal provisions.   The result is a holding pattern with real costs. In October 2021, Austria, France, Italy, Spain, the UK and the United States announced a transitional agreement: as long as Pillar One progressed, the U.S. would not impose retaliatory tariffs, and European DST liabilities would be creditable against future Pillar One obligations. That truce has largely held, but it depends on continued progress.   For businesses, the uncertainty complicates planning. A multinational may face a DST in India, a diverted profits tax in the UK, a Pillar Two top-up in the EU, and the prospect of Pillar One reallocation all with different calculation bases and documentation requirements.

By Ayesha Jamil Rao The recent protests led by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) have reignited debate over the state of governance and education in India. Backed by students, artists, educators, public intellectuals, and activists including education reformer Sonam Wangchuk. The movement reflects not only dissatisfaction with education policy but also growing concern about the functioning of public institutions. For many protesters, the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan marked a symbolic victory. Yet it also raises a more fundamental question: has anything truly changed, or has one political actor simply been replaced by another operating within the same institutional framework? Replacing an individual rarely changes the character of an institution. At most, it creates a vacancy for someone else to occupy the same office. History repeatedly shows that leaders who enter politics with reformist ambitions can gradually become defenders of the very system they once challenged. Dharmendra Pradhan’s own political journey illustrates this paradox. As a student, he participated in protests against irregularities in the 1986 Odisha Board examinations. Decades later, he found himself at the centre of another wave of student discontent. His story is a reminder that institutions often shape leaders more profoundly than leaders reshape institutions. If that is true, then meaningful political change requires more than replacing ministers or governments; it requires reforming the institutions through which power is exercised. India is far from unique in facing this dilemma. Democracies across the world have witnessed protest movements that successfully remove leaders but struggle to transform the institutions that produced them. Bangladesh’s 2024 student-led movement offers one of the clearest recent examples. What began as opposition to the quota system for public-sector jobs gained momentum after inflammatory remarks by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina toward protesters. The movement eventually culminated in Hasina’s resignation and the formation of an interim government under Nobel Peace Prize laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus. It also compelled the authorities to reduce the controversial quota allocation from 56 percent to 7 percent. These were significant achievements. Yet history reminds us that changing a government is not the same as changing a political system. The departure of a leader does not automatically reform the institutions that enabled that leader to accumulate power. The Bangladeshi experience raises a broader question. Why do youth-led movements repeatedly succeed in bringing down governments but struggle to transform the institutions that generated the public grievances in the first place? The answer lies in the slow nature of democratic decline. Democracies seldom collapse overnight. More often, they weaken gradually as institutions become vulnerable to political capture, allowing successive governments to consolidate power regardless of who occupies office. This pattern can be seen in India’s debates over institutional accountability, Bangladesh’s uncertain transition, and Pakistan’s recurring cycles of political instability. Public discourse often centres on individual leaders, while far less attention is given to strengthening the constitutional, judicial, electoral, and administrative structures that determine how political power is exercised. As a result, governments change, but the deeper institutional weaknesses remain. None of this diminishes the importance of protest. Public demonstrations remain one of democracy’s most powerful instruments of accountability and, in many cases, the only effective means available to citizens confronting unresponsive governments. The challenge, however, is to ensure that protests do more than produce changes in political leadership. Their long-term success should be measured by whether they make it harder for any future government—regardless of ideology or electoral mandate—to manipulate state institutions for partisan advantage. The lessons extend beyond South Asia. The Arab Spring demonstrated both the promise and the limitations of revolutionary politics. Popular uprisings removed long-standing rulers in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen, but the outcomes differed dramatically. Tunisia initially achieved a negotiated constitutional transition. Egypt saw the return of military dominance. Libya descended into prolonged civil conflict, while Yemen entered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Together, these experiences underscore an enduring lesson: removing rulers without strengthening institutions rarely produces lasting democratic change. For South Asia, sustainable democratic reform depends less on replacing individual leaders than on rebuilding the institutions that organise political power. Youth movements can play an important role by advocating transitional constitutional and institutional reform commissions that bring together young lawyers, academics, technocrats, policy professionals, and civil society representatives. Their agenda should also include judicial independence, electoral integrity, civil service reform, stronger oversight institutions, and more effective legislative accountability. Digital mobilisation can amplify public grievances, but it cannot by itself draft constitutions, reform public institutions, or build resilient democracies. That requires broad and sustained coalitions involving labour unions, bar councils, journalists, academics, and civil society organisations long after the energy of street protests has faded. Bangladesh’s 2024 movement, alongside similar experiences in India, Pakistan, and the Arab Spring, shows that removing a government is only the first step. Toppling a government is an event; building institutions is a generational project. In the end, the true measure of democratic success is not which leaders fall, but whether stronger institutions emerge in their place.