Ever since taking power in 1999, President Musharraf has insisted that his goal is “real democracy” for Pakistan, which has been notoriously ill-served by its grasping and irresponsible political elites. All generals say similar things, but in the light of Pakistan’s history and social fractures it is hard to dispute the need to fashion civil and constitutional safeguards robust enough to guard against the return of a travesty of democracy, indelibly stained by feudalism, incompetence and corruption.

President Musharraf deserves praise not only for his resolute opposition to fanaticism, but for his efforts to modernise Pakistan, not least by improving the appalling legal status of women. But he has shown little enthusiasm for returning his country, as promised, to democratically elected government. The distrust that his reluctance to step down has engendered has abruptly assumed the dimensions of a constitutional crisis, thanks to a signal error of judgment on his part. Acting on allegations of abuse of authority whose substance has yet to be made public, he has suspended the outspoken Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Iftikar Mohammed Chaudhry.

The result is uproar. The judge, who refuses to resign, was kept under virtual house arrest until yesterday, when he appeared before the Supreme Judicial Council and issued a blistering attack on the President, accusing him of violating the Constitution as well as his personal liberty. Across the country, lawyers in business suits have turned out en masse to protest, and have been filmed being beaten by police with bamboo batons before the gates of law courts. Judges are refusing to sit, and barristers will not plead cases. Pakistan is literally without the rule of law.

The Government stands accused on all sides of trampling on the independence of the judiciary, a particularly sensitive issue in Pakistan, where just judges have often been the only bulwark against dictatorship and civilian misrule alike. Mr Chaudhry is respected both as a reformer who has dramatically cut the backlog of cases pending before the Supreme Court and as a champion of human rights who has energetically taken up cases of terrorism suspects who have “disappeared” in police or intelligence custody.

It is useless for the Government to deny any political motive. Its action is almost universally seen as an attempt to tame the judiciary before elections this year under rules that are expected to come under legal challenge.

President Musharraf must calm this storm. He must wait for the Supreme Judicial Council’s verdict, but he can then use his discretion. Unless the case against Mr Chaudhry is far more damning than anything said by the Government has yet suggested, he should be reinstated. Good generals know when to retreat.