Punjab says it wants to fight hooliganism, extortion, gang activity, weapon displays, harassment, digital blackmail and organised crime. No serious person can deny that these are real problems. Citizens do need protection from gangs, intimidation, street violence, land grabbers, blackmailers and repeat offenders who operate with impunity.

But the real question is not whether crime should be fought. The real question is how.

The Punjab Control of Habitual Offenders and Anti-Social Behaviour Bill, 2026, raises a disturbing possibility: that in the name of public safety, Punjab may be building a system where punishment can begin before conviction, where executive authorities can label a person dangerous before a court proves guilt, and where the machinery of the state can freeze a citizen’s financial, digital and civic life on the basis of suspicion, intelligence assessment or repeated police action.

That is why this bill deserves close scrutiny. It is not merely another anti-crime law. It is a test of what kind of state Punjab wants to become.

Punishment before conviction

The most serious concern with the proposed law is that it appears to blur the line between accusation and guilt.

In any justice system based on due process, the state investigates, prosecutes, proves guilt, and then punishes. The court is supposed to be the place where evidence is tested, witnesses are examined, the accused is heard, and guilt is established. The 2026 bill risks reversing that order.

Under the framework described in the bill and related reporting, a person may face serious restrictions not only after conviction, but also through administrative processes involving intelligence committees, police records, arrests, challans or “credible evidence.” This is where the danger lies. Arrest is not conviction. A police challan is not conviction. Suspicion is not conviction. Intelligence input is not conviction.

Yet the consequences being discussed are not minor. They include electronic monitoring, surveillance, freezing of bank accounts, blocking of CNICs and passports, confiscation of devices, biometric data collection, property attachment, and entry into official offender registries.

This is not ordinary policing. This is punishment before the trial has fully done its work.

In Pakistan’s criminal justice system, cases often take years. People are arrested and later acquitted. Political workers, poor citizens, protesters and local rivals are sometimes dragged into cases that do not survive judicial scrutiny. If repeated arrest or police paperwork becomes enough to mark someone as a “habitual offender,” then the police do not merely investigate crime. They help create the legal identity of the accused.

That is a dangerous shift.

From the Goonda Act to digital Goonda Raj

The Punjab government presents the bill as a replacement for the old Goonda Act framework. On paper, replacing an outdated colonial-style law may sound like reform. But the key question is whether the new law reduces arbitrary power or modernises it.

The old model of control relied on police surveillance, movement restrictions, reporting requirements and administrative labels. The new model adds the tools of the digital state: CNIC blocking, bank account freezing, electronic bracelets, phone confiscation, social media removal, biometric databases, possible DNA collection and surveillance through modern technology.

This is why the bill can be understood as a move from old Goonda law to digital Goonda Raj.

The British colonial state maintained registers, watched communities, restricted movement, and used preventive labels to control people it considered threatening. The post-colonial state seems to have inherited that instinct. But now the same instinct is armed with databases, digital identity systems, mobile phones, online platforms, financial tracking and electronic monitoring.

The colonial state could restrict your movement. The digital state can restrict your movement, money, identity, communication and online existence at the same time.

That is the central danger.

Who defines “anti-social behaviour”?

A law is only as safe as its definitions. If a law clearly targets murder, extortion, organised gangs, armed intimidation, kidnapping, drug trafficking or violent crime, citizens can understand its scope. But when a law includes vague categories such as “annoying” people in public, using abusive language, spreading misinformation, obscenity, public nuisance or other undefined conduct, it becomes much easier to misuse.

The phrase “anti-social behaviour” may sound harmless, but legally it can be extremely elastic. What is annoying? What is obscene? What is misinformation? What is public nuisance? Who decides? A court? A regulator? A police officer? An intelligence committee? A district administration officer?

This matters because vague laws create fear. Citizens begin to self-censor not because they are criminals, but because they do not know where the legal boundary is. A protest can be called nuisance. A critical post can be called misinformation. A heated argument can be called abusive public conduct. A political gathering can be described as disorder. A local dispute can become a law-and-order file.

The broader the definition, the easier the abuse.

If the goal is to fight serious crime, the law should be narrow, precise and evidence-based. If the law is too broad, it stops looking like a crime-control measure and starts looking like a flexible toolkit for suppression.

Intelligence committees as judge, jury and executioner

Another major concern is the role of District Intelligence Committees and executive authorities. The bill gives these structures significant influence in identifying, recommending and initiating action against individuals.

This creates a due process problem.

Intelligence is not the same as evidence. Intelligence reports may be useful for investigation, but they are not a substitute for open judicial proceedings. Intelligence is often secret. It is not always disclosed to the accused. It may not be tested through cross-examination. It may rely on informants, police assumptions, local rivalries or political pressure.

If intelligence committees become the gateway to severe restrictions, then citizens may be punished through files they cannot fully see, allegations they cannot properly challenge, and processes controlled by the same executive system that initiated action against them.

This creates the appearance of a parallel justice system.

The proper role of intelligence should be to assist investigation. It should not replace trial. If the state has strong evidence, it should present that evidence before a court. If the evidence is too weak to survive in court, the state should not be allowed to achieve the same result through administrative punishment.

Civil death without trial

One of the most alarming features of the bill is the range of sanctions that can affect a person’s ordinary life.

A CNIC is not just a card. In Pakistan, it is the key to banking, SIM registration, travel, employment, property transactions, government services, hospital processes and almost every formal part of life. A bank account is not just money. It is rent, school fees, medical expenses, business payments, salaries and family survival.

If the state blocks a person’s CNIC or freezes their bank account before conviction, the punishment does not stop with the accused. It hits the family. It hits dependents. It can destroy a small business. It can prevent travel for work or treatment. It can cut a person off from basic modern existence.

This is why such measures should not be treated casually. Blocking someone’s financial and civic identity is not a routine administrative step. It is a form of civil death.

Even if a person is later acquitted, the damage may already be done. The job may be lost. The business may collapse. The family may be humiliated. The social media presence may be gone. The data may have been copied. The reputation may be destroyed.

A justice system cannot say, “We will punish you first and correct the record later.”

The privacy and surveillance problem

The bill also raises serious privacy concerns. Electronic monitoring, modern surveillance, biometric collection, phone and laptop confiscation, data extraction, fingerprints, handwriting samples and possible DNA collection all move the state deeper into the private life of the citizen.

There are cases where such tools may be justified. Violent repeat offenders, organised criminal networks and serious threats may require modern investigative methods. But the safeguards must be strict. There must be judicial oversight. The purpose must be clear. The duration must be limited. The data must be protected. There must be accountability for misuse.

Without strong safeguards, a crime-control law can become a surveillance law.

Phones and laptops are not ordinary objects. They contain private conversations, journalistic sources, family photos, business records, political discussions, passwords, location history and personal memories. Confiscating a device and extracting its data is not the same as taking a physical file from a desk. It can expose an entire life.

If such powers are granted without prior judicial approval, strict necessity tests and data protection rules, they will almost certainly be abused.

The speech and censorship angle

The inclusion of misinformation, online conduct and social media-related restrictions opens another front: speech control.

Pakistan already has a tense relationship with online expression. Journalists, activists, political workers and ordinary citizens often face pressure over social media posts. In that environment, any law that allows account removal, device confiscation or action over vague online behaviour must be treated with caution.

The danger is not that all misinformation should be protected. The danger is that “misinformation” can become a political weapon. Governments often call inconvenient facts misinformation. Officials may call criticism fake news. Police may treat satire, protest slogans or opposition messaging as disorder.

If a person spreads a deliberate lie that causes violence, blackmail, panic or harm, the state already has legal tools. But if the new law creates another route to remove accounts or seize devices without strong judicial safeguards, it can become a censorship instrument.

The test is simple: who decides what is misinformation, and through what process?

If the answer is an intelligence committee or executive authority, the risk is obvious.

Property rights under pressure

The bill’s property-related powers also deserve scrutiny. Freezing bank accounts, seizing movable property, attaching immovable property and restricting access to assets are severe actions.

The state may argue that criminals use property, vehicles, weapons, phones, shops, houses or accounts to support illegal activity. That may be true in some cases. But property action must be tied to evidence, proportionality and judicial review.

If property can be restricted first and reviewed later, the process itself becomes punishment. A shopkeeper accused in a false case can lose business. A family home can become legally entangled. A vehicle used for work can be seized. A bank account holding lawful earnings can be frozen.

The law must distinguish between proceeds of crime and ordinary property. It must also distinguish between convicted criminals and accused persons. Without that distinction, property restrictions become a pressure tactic.

The poor will face it first

On paper, laws apply equally. In practice, coercive laws rarely hit everyone equally.

A wealthy accused person can hire lawyers, secure media attention, reach senior officials and challenge orders quickly. A poor accused person may not even understand the process. A political worker in a village, a young man from a working-class neighbourhood, a street vendor, a labourer, a motorcycle rider, or a person caught in a local feud may find himself trapped inside a system he cannot fight.

This is the social justice angle.

Laws that give wide discretion to police and district administrations often become tools against those with the least protection. The poor are easier to arrest, easier to label, easier to pressure and easier to forget. Once entered into a registry or marked as a habitual offender, they may carry that stigma for years.

The law may be written for gangsters. But it may be used first against the powerless.

The animal cruelty contradiction

One of the more revealing features of the proposed law is the inclusion of cruelty to animals within the list of anti-social behaviour. In principle, cruelty to animals should be taken seriously. A society’s treatment of animals reflects its moral and legal character.

But the state’s own conduct matters.

Punjab has repeatedly faced criticism over stray dog culling practices, with animal rights groups alleging poisoning and inhumane killing. Courts have also been approached over such operations. If the same state that struggles to follow humane animal-control standards now gives itself power to punish citizens for animal cruelty, the contradiction is hard to ignore.

The issue is not whether animal cruelty should be punishable. It should be. The issue is selective enforcement. A law that punishes citizens for cruelty while ignoring cruelty by state authorities becomes morally hollow.

The state cannot demand compassion from citizens while reserving brutality for itself.

Public safety versus authoritarian convenience

Supporters of the bill will argue that Punjab needs stronger tools. They will say ordinary law is too slow, gangsters exploit delay, witnesses are intimidated, extortion networks operate openly, weapons are displayed on social media, and repeat offenders return to crime because the system is weak.

Some of that criticism is valid. Pakistan’s criminal justice system is slow. Prosecution is weak. Witness protection is poor. Police investigation often lacks capacity. Organised crime adapts faster than law.

But this is precisely why reforms should strengthen investigation, prosecution, forensic capacity, witness protection, courts and accountability. Instead, laws like this often strengthen executive shortcut powers.

That is the difference between rule of law and rule by file.

Rule of law means the state proves its case. Rule by file means the state labels you first and asks you to fight your way out.

What a better law would look like

If Punjab genuinely wants to tackle habitual offenders and organised crime, it can still do so without building an overbroad surveillance regime.

A better law would clearly define serious offences. It would remove vague categories such as “annoying” behaviour unless precisely explained. It would require prior judicial approval for major actions like account freezing, CNIC blocking, device confiscation, data extraction, property attachment and electronic monitoring. It would ensure that arrests alone cannot be treated as proof of habitual criminality. It would require convictions or strong judicially tested evidence before severe restrictions are imposed.

It would create a time-bound process. It would allow the accused to access the evidence against them, except in narrowly defined cases where a court approves confidentiality. It would create penalties for officials who misuse the law. It would protect journalists, whistleblowers, political speech and peaceful protest. It would include data protection rules for biometrics, DNA and seized digital material. It would ensure that any registry has a review and deletion mechanism if a person is acquitted.

Most importantly, it would keep the court at the centre.

The state can fight crime without abandoning due process. In fact, if the state abandons due process, it weakens the legitimacy of its own fight against crime.

The colonial hangover

The deepest criticism of this bill is historical.

South Asia inherited a colonial state designed not primarily to serve citizens, but to control populations. The colonial bureaucracy classified, watched, registered, restricted and punished communities it considered troublesome. That mindset did not disappear with independence. It survived in police culture, district administration, preventive detention laws, public order regulations, surveillance practices and emergency-style governance.

The Punjab Control of Habitual Offenders and Anti-Social Behaviour Bill, 2026, appears to continue that tradition. It takes the old colonial impulse to classify dangerous people and gives it modern technology.

The British Raj had registers. Punjab now has databases. The Raj had surveillance. Punjab now has electronic monitoring. The Raj restricted movement. Punjab can restrict identity, money, phones, property and online presence.

This is why the bill is bigger than one piece of legislation. It reflects the long continuity of the administrative mind: control first, rights later.

Conclusion: crime control cannot become citizen control

Punjab has every right to fight organised crime, extortion, harassment, weapon culture and digital blackmail. Citizens deserve safety. Victims deserve justice. Repeat offenders should not be allowed to terrorise communities.

But safety cannot be built by weakening the very rights that protect citizens from arbitrary power.

The central question is simple: should the state be allowed to freeze your bank account, block your identity, seize your devices, monitor your movement, collect your biometrics, restrict your property and damage your reputation before proving your guilt in court?

If the answer is yes, then the issue is no longer just crime control. It is the restructuring of citizenship itself.

A democratic government should not fear judicial oversight. If the evidence is strong, take it to court. If the accused is guilty, convict and punish. But if the state cannot prove guilt, it should not be allowed to achieve punishment through administrative labels.

Punjab does not need a digital Goonda Raj. It needs better policing, stronger prosecution, faster courts, witness protection, forensic capacity and a justice system that punishes the guilty without destroying the rights of the accused.

The fight against crime is necessary. But the fight must remain constitutional.

Otherwise, the state may defeat the gangster only to become something far more dangerous: a government that can treat suspicion as guilt and control as justice.