As of September 15, 2026, mobile data and broadband in Pakistan-administered Kashmir have been suspended for more than 100 days, according to Al Jazeera. The cut began on June 5, the day authorities banned the Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee (JKJAAC) and moved against protests over electoral reform. Staggered elections ended on August 10 and a new government has formed, yet websites and apps used for online banking remain unreachable and entrance exams have been postponed.
The strongest case for the authorities
The security argument deserves a fair hearing. Protests in the territory turned deadly. Al Jazeera reports that residents and local estimates put the toll above 50, including seven law enforcement personnel, though those figures could not be independently verified. Officials facing that kind of unrest can argue that mobile networks let crowds organise faster than police can respond, and that rumours travel faster than corrections. Pakistan's Supreme Court has endorsed part of this logic. In Pakistan Telecommunication Authority v. CM Pak Limited, decided April 22, 2020, it set aside a High Court decision and upheld the regulator's power to suspend services on national security and public safety grounds, according to Columbia University's Global Freedom of Expression database. It reasoned that Section 54(3) of the Telecommunication Act, which concerns a presidential emergency, and Section 8(2)(c), which allows pre-emptive national security action, address different circumstances.
Why 100 days fails even that test
A power to suspend services in an emergency is not a power to suspend them for a season. The July 27 clashes and the August 10 final vote are behind us. Al Jazeera notes that the shutdown continues despite the formation of the new government. Whatever the case for a short, targeted suspension around the most volatile days, the case for keeping banking dark weeks after the last ballot is very hard to make.
The costs also fall on people who have no connection to the protests. Blocked banking access hurts shopkeepers, salaried workers and remittance recipients. Postponed entrance exams disrupt the academic year for students. None of this reduces the risk of violence. It only moves the burden onto ordinary residents.
What the courts have said about proportionality
The legal debate in Pakistan predates this shutdown. On February 26, 2018, the Islamabad High Court held that suspending mobile services was ultra vires of Section 54. It found that concerns about public safety or law and order cannot justify invoking the provision. It also held that the fundamental rights in Articles 10-A, 9, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 19-A are violated when users are deprived of mobile services. The Institute for Human Rights and Business summarised the court's reading of Section 54(3) as permitting network shutdowns only when a presidential emergency has been declared.
The Supreme Court's 2020 decision narrowed that holding. It did not turn shutdowns into a limitless tool. The regulator's authority rests on national security and public safety, so its use should meet a test of necessity and proportionality. A suspension that outlasts the election, the unrest and the transition of power is hard to describe as a pre-emptive security measure.
A workable standard
IHRB's commentary lists safeguards that any legitimate shutdown regime should include: limits to real and imminent threats, restricted duration and geographic scope, public notification where feasible, continuous access to emergency services, and regular legal review. Applied to Kashmir, these translate into concrete rules:
- Publish the order. Residents and courts should be able to read who ordered the suspension, under which provision, and for how long.
- Set an expiry. Any suspension should lapse automatically after a short period unless a named authority renews it with reasons.
- Ring-fence essential services. Banking, health and education platforms should be whitelisted, because their restoration carries little security risk.
- Require independent review. A court or independent panel should test each renewal against the necessity standard.
This approach also serves the state's goals. A government trying to show that its new legislature is legitimate loses credibility when citizens cannot use a bank or sit an exam. Shutdowns also push commerce and skilled workers elsewhere, and they undercut the digital economy Pakistan says it wants to grow.
What to watch
The measure of this episode is whether the restrictions end now that elections are over, and whether any court reviews the orders. If the blackout persists without a published legal basis or an end date, the 2020 ruling risks becoming a licence for indefinite suspension. Pakistan would then have moved from allowing emergency measures to normalising a standing restriction on a whole territory's internet. Proportionate regulation of security risks means the restriction must end when the emergency does.