Fifty years, twenty-seven amendments and counting

Pakistan’s Constitution, approved by the National Assembly on April 10, 1973, and signed into law by the then-President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto two days later, came into force on August 14 of the same year. It marked a historic shift from a presidential to a parliamentary democracy, with Bhutto becoming prime minister and Chaudhry Fazal Elahi elected as the first president.

Yet within just a year, the ink had barely dried before the first amendment arrived. Since then, the Constitution has been revised dozens of times, each reflecting the country’s political anxieties, ideological divides, and power struggles. The story of these amendments is, in many ways, the story of Pakistan itself.

The Early Years: Defining the State and Its Boundaries

The First Amendment (1974) came less than a year after the Constitution took effect. Pakistan had hosted the Islamic Summit Conference in Lahore earlier that year, where Muslim leaders urged the country to recognize Bangladesh. When Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Mujibur Rahman arrived in Lahore, Pakistan finally accepted the new reality.

But the Constitution still referred to East Pakistan as part of the Islamic Republic. Article 1 had to be revised to define the country’s territories accurately. The amendment also allowed high court judges to be temporarily transferred between provinces — a modest administrative tweak that would gain greater weight decades later.

A few months later, the Second Amendment (September 1974) followed the Rabwah incident, when a clash between Muslim students and Ahmadi youth spiraled into a nationwide movement. Under public pressure, the government amended Articles 106 and 260 to declare Ahmadis as non-Muslims — setting a precedent where faith became a matter of constitutional definition rather than personal belief.

Bhutto’s government continued to reshape the Constitution. The Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments (1975–76) consolidated executive power in the name of national security and judicial reform. They restricted the courts’ ability to grant bail, expanded emergency powers, and gave the prime minister influence over judicial appointments and retirements. Framed as administrative improvements, they effectively weakened institutional checks on the executive.

In 1977, amid growing unrest, the Seventh Amendment allowed the prime minister to seek a vote of confidence directly from the public through a referendum — an attempt to bypass Parliament and regain legitimacy. Months later, martial law was declared, and General Zia-ul-Haq took power, ending the country’s first real experiment with parliamentary democracy.

Zia’s Era and Aftermath: Faith and Power

Under Gen Zia, the Constitution became both a shield and a tool. The Eighth Amendment (1985) legalized his martial law and gave the President sweeping powers, including the right to dissolve assemblies at will. It transformed Pakistan’s system into a semi-presidential one, where authority no longer rested squarely with Parliament.

Zia also proposed a 9th Amendment to enforce Sharia as the supreme law — a move that would have made him “Ameer-ul-Momineen” — but it never passed.

The years that followed saw several smaller amendments, from the Tenth (1987) to the Sixteenth (1999), dealing mostly with parliamentary procedures, quotas, and administrative details. Yet the deeper struggle between civilian and military authority persisted.

The Democratic Decades: Power Shifts and Political Instability

In 1997, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif used the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments to curb presidential powers and enforce party discipline. It was meant to stabilize governance but ended up centralizing authority in the Prime Minister’s Office.

The Fifteenth Amendment, introduced a year later, attempted to make Sharia the supreme law of the land and would have allowed constitutional changes through a simple majority. The public backlash was immediate, and the proposal died in Parliament.

When General Pervez Musharraf seized power in 1999, the cycle repeated. His Seventeenth Amendment (2003) validated his coup, restored presidential authority, and shielded his actions from judicial scrutiny.

Democracy returned in 2008, setting the stage for one of the most consequential reforms in Pakistan’s history.

The Eighteenth Amendment: A Moment of Consensus

The Eighteenth Amendment (2010) was a rare moment of unity. It rolled back many of Zia’s and Musharraf’s powers, restored Pakistan’s original parliamentary character, devolved authority to the provinces, renamed NWFP as Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, strengthened the Council of Common Interests, and introduced a transparent system for judicial appointments.

For once, Pakistan’s political class seemed to share a vision of federal democracy. The Nineteenth (2011) and Twentieth (2012) Amendments refined these reforms by reducing executive influence in judicial appointments and formalizing caretaker setups before elections.

But consensus, as always, proved temporary.

Security, Crisis, and Control

The Twenty-First Amendment (2015) followed the tragic Army Public School attack in Peshawar, temporarily authorizing military courts to try terrorism cases. Though meant to expire after two years, the Twenty-Third Amendment (2017) extended their mandate.

Meanwhile, the Twenty-Second (2016) and Twenty-Fourth (2017) Amendments addressed bureaucratic and electoral adjustments, while the Twenty-Fifth (2018) merged FATA with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — a long-overdue step toward integrating marginalized regions into the national framework.

The Era of Judicial and Political Engineering

The Twenty-Sixth Amendment (2024) came in the wake of a fiercely contested election and the retirement of Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa. His successor, Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, was widely seen as independent-minded — perhaps too much so for the government’s comfort.

The amendment altered the traditional seniority rule, fixed the Chief Justice’s term at three years, and gave the executive greater control over judicial appointments. It also created a constitutional bench within the Supreme Court, heavily influenced by the government.

Soon after, that same bench upheld decisions that tilted the balance of power toward the executive, from approving military courts to transferring PTI’s reserved seats to the ruling coalition. Reports surfaced that opposition lawmakers were coerced into supporting the amendment, deepening public mistrust.

The 27th Amendment: Expanding the State’s Reach

The Twenty-Seventh Amendment (November 2025) took this process even further. It established a new court for constitutional matters, with judges initially appointed by the government. It also granted lifelong immunity to the President, designated the Chief of Army Staff as the supreme commander of all armed forces, and placed the rank of Field Marshal beyond accountability.

The amendment also formalized the transfer of High Court judges across provinces and expanded federal authority over subjects like health, education, and population prompting fears of a rollback of the provincial autonomy gained under the Eighteenth Amendment.

To secure its passage, the government reportedly broke away individual senators from opposition parties. What was once impossible “a two-thirds majority”,  became suddenly achievable. Many citizens asked how a Parliament born of a disputed election could repeatedly rewrite the country’s supreme law with such ease that too with the leader of the house, remotely sitting in Baku.

The Bigger Question

Fifty years after its birth, Pakistan’s Constitution stands as less a social contract and more a reflection of whoever holds power at a given moment. Each amendment tells a story: sometimes of reform, sometimes of fear, and often of control. For most Pakistanis, constitutional reform feels like an elite conversation far removed from daily struggles, yet its effects quietly shape governance, justice, and the very idea of democracy.

The larger question is: what do these changes mean for ordinary citizens? Do they make it easier to resolve an inheritance dispute that has lingered for decades, or bring faster justice to those awaiting trial? Or do they pull institutions like the Punjab CCD back in front of a judiciary that has become judge, jury, and executioner all at once? Or are they simply about political maneuvering and institutional turf wars?

Another question it raises is why these developments have provoked senior puisne judge Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Athar Minallah to write letters to the Chief Justice, calling for a convention of all higher judiciary to discuss the matter. Are these, perhaps, the few sane voices left amid the chaos?

As talk of a Twenty-Eighth Amendment begins, one truth endures: Pakistan’s Constitution remains a living document — but one too often rewritten to serve rulers rather than the ruled. Until it begins to protect the powerless as fiercely as it empowers the powerful, every amendment, however noble in language, will remain unfinished business.

Fifty years on, our Constitution has become less a covenant of governance and more a diary of our fears—amended not to empower citizens, but to protect those in power. Each regime has inscribed its insecurities into it: generals to legalize coups, politicians to muzzle rivals, judges to preserve influence.

If the document no longer restrains authority but accommodates it, then the real question isn’t how many amendments we’ve had, but whether we still have a Constitution at all.

What Pakistan needs now is not another clause, subclause, or “reform.” It needs a collective admission that we have treated the Constitution as an instrument of survival, not as the soul of a republic. Until it becomes untouchable by convenience and immune to fear, it will continue to be rewritten by the powerful and unread by the powerless.

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