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Colonial Legal Continuities in Post-colonial Pakistan: The Katchi Abadi of Qayyumabad and the Construction of Law, Ownership, and Crime

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Criminal Legalities and Minorities in the Global South

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Abstract

This chapter argues that the current legal institution of Pakistan is enmeshed in colonial legal logics illustrated through its colonial property and land reform legislations and a broken and often powerless criminal justice system. The Katchi Abadi Act on 1987 has been projected as monumental because it enshrines ownership rights and protections against displacement and or encroachment for the inhabitants of ‘non-permanent’ settlements. However, taking a closer look at the language of the law illustrates colonial legal logics which only appear to be giving legal rights and recognition to katchi abadis. Meanwhile the act uses language to invoke its ‘non-permanence’ or ‘informality’ and places itself above the law by exonerating itself in the event that the state legally or illegally obtains land over which katchi abadis are established. Furthermore, the overworked, underfunded, and backlogged criminal justice system is often too late in adjudicating decisions with limited recourse available for those who are wronged.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Pakistan is a federation of four provinces including Sindh, Punjab, Balochistan, and Khyber Pukhtun.

  2. 2.

    In highlighting the problems with the term ‘post-colonial,’ Olaniyan (1993, 746) argues that, ‘Implicit in [a] justified unease in claiming ‘post-colonial’ is the discriminating recognition that we are living a temporality that is not so easily, so triumphantly categorized, located as it is between the end of formal empire and, as we have all agreed, the inability to be post-colonial.’

  3. 3.

    See Barkawi and Laffey (1999) for a discussion on the establishment of a transnational constitution of force under the banner of ‘peacekeeping’ and ‘peace-building’ implanted in former colonies through placement of the US troops.

  4. 4.

    The Karachi Metropolitan Corporation is a public corporation and governing body that provides municipal services in the city of Karachi.

  5. 5.

    The municipality of Karachi allotted the land to the DHA who had submitted documentation support their claims that the land belonged to the organization. However, a closer look at the document illustrates either an error at best or an attempted forgery at worst (Zaman and Ali 2016).

  6. 6.

    The Nation is one of the largest Pakistan-based newspaper printed in English and is frequently cited abroad. See https://nation.com.pk/about-us (accessed 13 June 2021).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Criminology & Sociolegal Studies, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

    Sabeen Kazmi

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  1. Sabeen Kazmi
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Correspondence to Sabeen Kazmi .

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  1. Department of Sociology, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    George B. Radics

  2. Department of Sociology, Social Policy and Criminology, University of Liverpool, Singapore, Singapore

    Pablo Ciocchini

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Kazmi, S. (2023). Colonial Legal Continuities in Post-colonial Pakistan: The Katchi Abadi of Qayyumabad and the Construction of Law, Ownership, and Crime. In: Radics, G.B., Ciocchini, P. (eds) Criminal Legalities and Minorities in the Global South. Palgrave Socio-Legal Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17918-1_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17918-1_7

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-17917-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-17918-1

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