Pakistan's president declared a state of emergency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) on Sunday, 11 October 2026, and suspended the provincial government led by Imran Khan's PTI. According to Arab News, the monitor NetBlocks reported late that day a "major disruption to Internet connectivity in parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa." The Pakistan Observer reported that Peshawar's services had reportedly been restored by Monday, while mobile and PTCL services in Swabi stayed down. Neither the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) nor the Interior Ministry has publicly explained the cut or said where it reached.
The silence is the core problem. A government is entitled to act in a security crisis. It is not entitled to leave citizens, businesses and courts guessing about what power it is using.
The strongest case for the government
The federal government's argument is serious. Islamabad says the KP government failed to tackle militancy in a province bordering Afghanistan, and Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said the government's concern was "entirely terrorism-related." Arab News reports that PTI supporters were gathering for a march on Islamabad. Mobile networks have been used to trigger explosives and to coordinate attacks, and security services often argue that local, short-lived cuts around a flashpoint are cheaper than the alternative. The government can also point to a legal hook: the emergency itself.
That hook matters because of how Pakistan's courts have read the law. In February 2018, the Islamabad High Court ruled that mobile network shutdowns were illegal, according to the Digital Rights Foundation's account of the judgment. The court read Section 54 of the Pakistan Telecommunication (Re-organization) Act 1996 narrowly. Suspension of services could be justified only through Section 54(3), after the President proclaims an emergency. The foundation's summary adds that the court found PTA directives issued without prior notice and justification to be "without lawful authority and jurisdiction." LiveLaw's report says the court also rejected reliance on Section 54(2), holding that the government's priority use of telecom systems is not a power to suspend services.
So a presidential emergency is exactly the trigger the court identified. If that were the end of the analysis, the government could argue it acted lawfully.
Why the legal question is still open
It is not the end of the analysis, for three reasons.
First, the scope of the trigger is untested. The 2018 reasoning concerned a national emergency proclaimed by the President. Whether a provincial emergency and governor's rule can unlock the same shutdown power, and how far it reaches, is a question I could find no ruling on. A power created for a national emergency should not stretch by assumption.
Second, the notice requirement does not vanish. The 2018 judgment, as summarised by the Digital Rights Foundation, objected to suspensions ordered without prior notice and justification. An emergency may supply the authority. It does not supply the explanation. No order, notification or PTA statement has surfaced publicly for the KP cuts.
Third, I could not verify the full current text of the statute. The PTA hosts an amended-up-to-2024 version of the Act listing Section 54 under "National Security." Anyone assessing the legality of this shutdown should read the current wording and any later amendments alongside the 2018 judgment. I did not find the final outcome of the government's reported appeal against the ruling, so the precedent's present status deserves a check too.
Proportionality is the test the cut must pass
Amnesty International's Babu Ram Pant said in a statement reported on 13 October that internet disruptions across the province raised questions about whether the emergency measures were necessary and proportionate. He added that "emergency measures are not a blank cheque to crack down on human rights, silence dissent, or concentrate power." That is the right frame.
A proportionate shutdown is targeted, time-limited, publicly justified and reviewable. The reporting so far describes the opposite: districts such as Swabi, which Arab News identifies as the destination for PTI's march, losing both mobile and PTCL fixed-line services, with no stated duration. Cutting PTCL services is notable because fixed lines usually carry banking, remote work and school systems, not mass mobilisation. Schools and universities have already closed, according to AsiaNews, which makes the loss of connectivity harder on students and day labourers.
There is also an evidence problem. The government says its concern is terrorism. Shutdowns that coincide with a political march invite the suspicion that the target is assembly, not attackers. Only a published rationale can rebut that suspicion, and none exists.
What a proportionate response looks like
- Publish the order. The PTA or Interior Ministry should state the legal provision invoked, the districts covered and the review date.
- Narrow the cut. If specific towns present a militant threat, throttle or suspend mobile data there. Leave fixed-line and broadband services running.
- Set a sunset. Any shutdown should expire automatically unless a named official renews it in writing.
- Allow review. Operators and citizens should be able to challenge the order before a court that has already said notice and justification matter.
- Report afterwards. The government should publish what was cut, for how long, and what security benefit it claims.
Pakistan's own court has already supplied the framework. The KP emergency tests whether it applies when the pressure is highest. A government confident in its security case should be willing to put its legal basis on the record. Until it does, the shutdown reads as an exercise of power without accountability, and that corrodes the openness that Pakistan's digital economy depends on.