The moment one of Pakistan’s most senior judges tossed my file aside and growled “Asad has no rights” was when I realised that the last fragile refuge for journalists in my country had finally, and perhaps inevitably, slammed shut. It was not compulsory, Chief Justice Sarfraz Dogar of the Islamabad High Court told my lawyer, that I accept every invitation to come my way. It did not matter that the constitution guarantees the freedom of movement to every citizen of Pakistan.
I was in court to challenge a government ban on my own freedom of movement, believing I had the same rights as the chief justice himself. It seemed not. I had no rights. The chief justice said so. Neither the constitution nor the law could protect me or, by extension, any Pakistani citizen. Especially those who are on the right side of history – but the wrong side of power. With that one angry sentence, Chief Justice Dogar effectively sanctioned the government’s ban on an unknown number of Pakistanis – among them journalists and rights activists – from exercising their constitutional right to leave the country if, as, and when they wish, like citizens of normal countries.
The tool the Pakistan government uses to do this is euphemistically called a “no-fly list”; officially, it is the Provisional National Identification List, or PNIL. Ostensibly, a measure to restrict suspects under investigation, it has become an arbitrary way of preventing individuals from leaving the country.
There is no specific law for the PNIL; it is not regulated or restricted by any judicial code. It seems to have been dreamt up in 2018 by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), a body that answers to the Ministry of the Interior and wields extraordinary authority with minimal oversight. Created in 1975, the FIA investigates federal crimes – terrorism, espionage, organised crime – and manages border control and transnational offences, such as smuggling and human trafficking. It also polices government corruption, tax evasion and bribery, as well as cybercrime, intellectual property disputes and immigration violations. In theory, it is Pakistan’s version of the FBI. In practice, it often behaves more like a political enforcement agency than a law enforcement one.
I have suspected for some time that my name was on the no-fly list, though no one confirmed it, and I hadn’t tested it by trying to leave. I am hardly new to the cruel reality of state repression. In recent years, my bank accounts – and those of my family – have been frozen. I have been detained without charge, beaten in my home by secret agents, accused of imaginary crimes, wiretapped, bugged and followed. This is all part of a sustained campaign to stop me reporting on the government, the military and the judiciary, as I have done throughout my career, first as a television producer and more recently on independent platforms.
But was I on the no-fly list? My lawyers had written repeatedly to the FIA asking for a simple yes or no, but received no reply. The names of people on the list are not public, and it is impossible to find out from the FIA who has been added, when, and why. While being on the no-fly list is supposed to last for a maximum of 30 days, no one knows when they are added, and few who get on it seem to know when, or even if, they have been removed. Without an official letter confirming that I was on the list, I couldn’t challenge it in court; the silence kept me in a legal limbo, a prisoner without a sentence. Pakistan’s bureaucracy has refined the absurd even beyond the Kafkaesque. Finally, in August, I got my answer. As I can now attest, the PNIL is a secret and nefarious method of illegal but state-sanctioned punishment for those who fall foul of the establishment. It is used to intimidate journalists who stray from the approved line, who expose corruption, or collusion between the political, military and, now, judicial authorities. It is used against activists demanding the return of the disappeared; farmers seeking the reconstruction of flood-hit villages; ordinary people calling for freedom of speech, belief, or simply protection from politically connected land developers.
Whereas regimes such as the Chinese Communist Party are happy to see their opponents and dissidents vanish into exile abroad, where their voices are dimmed to the point of irrelevance, Pakistan’s hybrid political-military establishment has transformed the country into a prison for anyone who dares to point out that the emperor has no clothes. That was the backdrop against which I found myself standing in Chief Justice Dogar’s courtroom, alongside my lawyers Imaan Mazari and Hadi Ali Chattha, fighting for the simple right to board a flight.
My journey there began on August 9, when they dropped me at Islamabad airport to take a flight to the United States. I had been awarded a fellowship by the US government to spend two weeks travelling across America with other professionals from Asia and the Pacific. The US Embassy in Islamabad had nominated me, and the US State Department had selected me for the prestigious International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP).
I stayed with the families of the abducted
The State Department says it is the “foundational professional exchange program” for advancing US national security priorities and building longterm relationships between American and international professionals. I was honoured and excited, of course, but also nervous about whether or not I would actually be able to join the program. My trepidation peaked when I went to a currency exchange to buy dollars and was recognised by the teller.
He raised an eyebrow and with a half-smile asked me: “Are you sure they’ll let you travel?”
It was meant as small talk, but it felt like a warning. In Pakistan, even strangers knew I was a journalist under surveillance, targeted for offending the powerful just by doing my job. That brief exchange summed up the climate in which I work. In the weeks before my scheduled departure, I had been covering a sit-in in Islamabad by families of missing persons from Balochistan. For almost two months, they had been protesting outside the National Press Club, in the broiling summer heat, demanding to know the fate of their husbands, sons and brothers who had been abducted by security agencies and never seen again.
My daily reports on their vigil angered the establishment. I had been told that my coverage was “annoying the deep state”. I knew that continuing to report on the protest could put me back on their radar, but I chose to stay with the families, rather than protect my personal interests. I was virtually alone in doing so.
Around this time, two journalist friends offered to negotiate my clearance with the authorities so that I could take up the American fellowship. I told them they could offer only two assurances on my behalf: that I would return to Pakistan, and that I would not meet any opposition figures abroad. Beyond that, I would not compromise.
Initially, they said they were told my name had been cleared for a onetime exit. Then, two days before the flight, the same officials informed my friends that the permission to leave had been revoked as I had not stopped criticising the security establishment in my reporting on the Baloch protests.
My friends urged me to go to the airport anyway. It’s a US State Department program, they said, doubting the Pakistani authorities would risk causing offence by banning me from taking it up. My flight was scheduled for 3am on August 9. Shortly after midnight, Imaan and Hadi, my lawyers and friends, drove me to Islamabad airport. They refused to leave until I boarded. They feared that I might not only be stopped but also detained and possibly even made to “disappear”, as has happened to others.
Inside the terminal, I collected my boarding pass and checked in my luggage. As I approached immigration, a few passengers and airport staff recognised and greeted me. I tried to stay calm, but my heart was pounding. At the counter, an officer from the FIA examined my passport, took my picture, and entered my details into his computer. All seemed normal. Then he paused, staring at the screen. Another officer came over. I heard the words: “It got a hit.” A third officer approached and told me to follow her. She led me to a waiting area where two men in plain clothes and another in uniform were seated. They photographed my passport and visa, and sent the images “to them”. I asked who was the “them” they were referring to; they ignored me. After about 10 minutes, one of the men returned and handed back my passport. It was stamped OFFLOADED. “Your name is on the PNIL,” he said. I asked why. He replied: “Only the Interior Ministry can tell you.”
At four in the morning, I walked out of the terminal carrying my suitcase and a sense of defeat heavier than the luggage. I had expected this outcome, but it still felt surreal – the official confirmation that I was now a prisoner of my own country. The following day, US Embassy officials said that if I could get the courts to rescind my no-fly status within five days, they would arrange a new flight. That gave me a tincture of hope, but I knew better than to expect a resolution in my favour.
Pakistan’s judiciary has long been influenced by the state, and the 26th constitutional amendment – passed in October 2024 to give the executive greater say over judicial appointments – had effectively brought the judiciary under the government’s control. Here in Islamabad, a new chief justice had a reputation for being close to the state.
Even so, my lawyer Imaan filed a petition in the Islamabad High Court. Two days later, the case was listed, though with technical objections attached – a bureaucratic hurdle that in ordinary cases the court removes without difficulty. Mine, however, was not an ordinary case. When the petition was taken up, the hearing was brief and tense. Chief Justice Dogar made no attempt to hide his irritation and refused to allow Imaan to complete her arguments. She reminded the court that the constitution guarantees every citizen the right to travel, but the bench declined to entertain the point. The file was set aside without any direction to the authorities.
A week later, the written order appeared. It contained just one line: “Objections on the petition sustained.” No explanation, no reasoning – only dismissal. That was the end of it. The order meant that I could not travel and there would be no further hearing. I lost the fellowship and, more painfully, the last semblance of judicial protection.
Previously, when the establishment had targeted me, I could still turn to the courts for limited relief. Now that door, too, had closed. What happened in that courtroom was more than a personal defeat; it confirmed that the institutions that exist to defend citizens’ rights had become instruments for denying them. My name remained on the no-fly list, and the judgment ensured it would stay there. In Pakistan, the law no longer shields those who question power. It shields power from being questioned.