By Aumer Baloch
There was a time when mentioning a name like Dr. Mahrang Baloch would ignite resistance. Her voice, steady and unwavering, echoed through the valleys of Balochistan and into the conscience of a state that preferred silence. As the leader of the Baloch Yekjehti Committee, she became the face of courage, relentlessly demanding answers for the thousands who had vanished without a trace; brothers, fathers, sons, and even schoolchildren are abducted in broad daylight, often in the presence of weeping families who could do nothing but beg the sky for justice.
But now, she has vanished behind the walls of an undisclosed dungeon, swallowed by the very system she stood against. And this time, something is even more terrifying than her disappearance: the silence that followed.
Where are the protests that once filled the streets? Where is the national outrage, the student solidarity, the hashtags, the media debates? This time, the roads are empty, the headlines are few, and the silence is loud. This is what normalization looks like. A process not only of repression but of conditioning, teaching a people, slowly and brutally, that disappearance is no longer an anomaly. It is an expectation.
In Balochistan, enforced disappearances have become part of the political climate, woven into the very fabric of life. The people have learned to live with the absence of justice, the erasure of names, and the fear of becoming the next number. Families hang faded photos of their missing loved ones in front of shuttered government offices, holding vigils that no longer make the news. They speak softly now, because speaking loudly has consequences. They do not ask if someone will be taken, they ask who’s next.
This normalization is not accidental. It is engineered through fear, silence, and the systematic erasure of memory. When the state treats the disappearance of its citizens as administrative routine, when security forces act with impunity, and when courts delay or dismiss the pleas of grieving mothers, a terrifying message is sent: your existence is conditional. Speak too loudly, organize too boldly, demand too consistently, and you will vanish.
Dr. Mahrang Baloch represented a challenge to that system. A woman, a doctor, an organizer, and most dangerously, unafraid. Her voice pierced through layers of indifference. She stood in Islamabad with the mothers of the disappeared. She faced tear gas, baton charges, and vilification. But her dignity never wavered. Now that she has been caged, a leader is in Pakistani dungeons. The people are watching not just what is being done to her, but what is not being done in response.
And that is perhaps the deepest wound: the public’s growing desensitization. The intellectuals have gone quiet. The mainstream media has moved on. The so-called democratic institutions look the other way. This passive complicity allows the machinery of abduction to operate smoothly, uninterrupted, under the cover of lawlessness disguised as national interest.
But normalization is not victory; it is decay. It is the death of democratic values. It is a society quietly strangling its own conscience while pretending it is just “business as usual.” When a country starts accepting the kidnapping of its citizens as a political tool, it loses more than its people. It loses its soul.
Today, Dr. Mahrang is not just a prisoner, but a symbol. Her silence must not be accepted as final. Her cause must not be erased with her absence. To normalize enforced disappearances is to surrender to tyranny. And to remain silent now is to be complicit in the crime.
In Balochistan, the land speaks through its graves, its missing, its grieving mothers and terrified children. It is crying out for acknowledgment, for truth. The question now is not whether we hear it, it is whether we dare to respond.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of The Balochistan Post or any of its editors.