The Anti-Terrorism (Amendment) Bill, 2026, passed by the Punjab Assembly, raises a well-known doctrinal question in counterterrorism law: the extent of the trade-off between procedures to safeguard justice-delivery staff and the defendant’s right to a fair trial. This legislation was adopted through an opposition boycott and a controversial quorum; however, its provisions are more significant.

The key provision is Section 21AAA, added as a new section to the Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997. Section 21AAA creates a new category of proceedings called a ‘special security case ‘. The case is marked as such by an authority consisting of an officer not below grade 20, who must abide by the same secrecy obligations imposed on the case file. Thereafter, the case is referred to an Anti-Terrorism Court judge by the Chief Justice of the Lahore High Court. Thereafter, the identities of all concerned persons, such as the judge, prosecutor, defense counsel, police personnel, and witnesses, are kept secret.

Judgment is given an official title, not the name of the judge presiding; witnesses can be referred to using their code numbers, and the hearing could take place in a safe environment or through videoconferencing, even in prisons. The nominating body chooses the prosecutor out of the five names provided by the prosecutor general. Importantly, the section applies notwithstanding the Anti-Terrorism Act and the Code of Criminal Procedure, a non obstante clause that displaces the ordinary procedural framework rather than supplementing it.

The rationale for enhanced protection is grounded in Pakistan’s documented experience of attacks against counterterrorism and security officials, including the 2015 assassination of Punjab Home Minister Colonel (retd.) Shuja Khanzada and the 2017 Lahore attack that killed senior police officer Captain Mubeen. Such incidents illustrate the security risks faced by officials involved in counterterrorism, although they do not themselves establish a specific pattern of attacks on witnesses during trials.

The question is therefore not whether Pakistani law recognises the need for protective measures. It already does. The more difficult question is why Section 21AAA establishes a substantially different framework in which the initial classification is placed with a designated executive authority rather than being controlled through the existing judicial safeguards in Section 21AA.

The principal constitutional challenge concerns Article 10-A, which guarantees the right to a fair trial and due process. There are several aspects of Section 21AAA that pertain to this discussion. The first point is that the decision regarding the classification is made unilaterally by the grade-20 officer and not on an individual basis after evaluation of each case, and this officer decides the pool for selection of the prosecuting attorney. This raises a separation-of-powers concern of the executive action of classification from the judicial nature of the proceeding.

The second aspect that is relevant here is the sealing of the file with the Chief Justice and the selected authority instead of sending the entire file to the High Court as was the case previously. The provision also raises questions about appellate scrutiny because the record is subject to a confidential regime. If the appellate court’s access to the complete record is restricted or practically impeded, this could affect the accused’s ability to challenge the conviction effectively. The concern is therefore not merely the confidentiality of the record itself, but whether adequate mechanisms remain for meaningful appellate review.

Thirdly, comparative practice, involving witness relocation, anonymous testimonies through technological devices, and limited access to the courtroom – such practices generally come together with a case-specific judicial clearance or similar forms of control, which are absent in the case of Section 21AAA of the Bill, according to its opponents. Such a problem could be solved using procedural regulations, but not by means of the Bill’s text.

There is also a question of legislative competence and conflict of laws. A separate constitutional question concerns legislative competence and the interaction between provincial legislation and federal criminal law; its interaction with federal legislation and constitutional guarantees is likely to be tested in court rather than resolved by the provincial legislature’s vote. This is consistent with the general position that a notwithstanding clause in provincial legislation does not immunize that legislation from constitutional review; it only signals legislative intent to override conflicting statutory provisions, leaving open whether it can lawfully override or coexist with constitutional guarantees such as Article 10-A.

The issue that remains in dispute is whether some protective measures are legal or not when dealing with terrorism caseworkers, since both parties are clear that some kind of measure is necessary. But rather, it is where the boundary is drawn as regards the distinction between lawful protective procedures and a lack of procedural safeguard: How much discretionary power should one person be allowed to exercise concerning the implementation of this special procedure without review, and whether judicial intervention at the classifying stage is possible through rule-making, or whether it should entail revisiting the statute altogether.

The constitutional question is therefore no longer hypothetical. A petition challenging Section 21AAA is already before the Lahore High Court. The eventual judicial assessment will likely turn on how the provision operates in practice, how narrowly “special security case” is interpreted, and whether sufficient procedural safeguards remain to reconcile confidentiality with Article 10-A’s guarantees of fair trial and due process.