IN FOCUS
GAME-CHANGER OR MILITARY’S NEW
BOON: CPEC AS A TOOL OF SOCIETAL AND
ECONOMIC INTERFERENCE
BY DIVYA ANAND* AND MONICA VERMA**
P
akistan has emerged as a classic case study of being a
praetorian state ever since its emergence with continual
fl ip-fl ops of civilian and military rule. Overtime the
military has assumed a predominant role as the sole guardian
of the national sovereignty and integrity of Pakistan. This
elite institution has not only controlled the important policy
imperatives including national security, defence and external
relations but has also consolidated power either directly or
indirectly in the domestic political channels of Pakistan
including its society and economy. A case in point is the
mega-project of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor worth
$46 billion and consisting of numerous infrastructure projects
to “deepen” economic ties between China and Pakistan. This
economic corridor will connect China’s largest province
Xinjiang, passing through Pakistan occupied Kashmir, with
Pakistan’s Gwadar port in Balochistan.
Many protagonists of the project have highlighted the
economic and geo-political benefi ts of CPEC for Pakistan in
the strategically important South-Asian region. They argue
that it will upgrade Pakistan’s overall stature, notwithstanding
the undermining of internal political dynamics in favour of
the military institution by entrenching its role and scope
even at the societal level. There emerges a contradiction
impacting the democratic façade of the country- on the one
hand, one witnessed the smooth transfer of power to another
civilian dispensation under the leadership of Imran Khan;
on the other hand, there emerged an indirect increased role
of the military through CPEC as the promoters of economic
and infrastructure development. For instance, for the
successful implementation the project, there is an increasing
“militarization” of Balochistan’s coastal belt. Considering
it to be an over-lapping economic-cum-national security
priority, the Pakistani military has deployed a large number of
police and paramilitary offi cers, a Special Security Division,
comprised of 15,580 army personnel and the Maritime
Security Force, to protect CPEC projects and the Chinese
workers. Such a move in a province already reeling under a
continuing hardened tussle between the Baloch nationalists
and the Army, adds on to the Army’s already increased military
presence and oppression to suppress the genuine demands of
Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Diplomatist • Vol 6 • Issue 10 • Oct-Nov 2018, Noida • 43