Military coups in Pakistan

This trend highlights a significant aspect of Pakistan's political landscape: the prevailing rule that the Pakistani military exercises influence wherever it deems necessary, often persisting despite potential repercussions.

The failure of the courts to support representative institutions in Federation of Pakistan v. Maulvi Tamizuddin Khan provided a pattern which later led to more open military intervention against elected governments to be justified using a doctrine of necessity.

Operation Fair Play was the code name for the coup d'etat conducted at midnight on July 4, 1977, by the military, led by Chief of Army Staff General Zia-ul-Haq, against the government of then-Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

[7] The martial law enforced by President General Zia introduced the strict form of conservatism which promoted the nationalistic, religious and anti-sectarianist ideologies.

Khan had dismissed both Benazir Bhutto in 1990 and Nawaz Sharif as Prime Minister in 1993, though the latter resulted in his own resignation and is known in Pakistan as the Waheed Kakar formula.

Colonel Tariq Rafi plotted a coup against the government of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto to establish a revolutionary military junta.