Commenting on a video of a female Baloch protester, Hanif said that he was ashamed that a new generation was being denied basic dignity.

“In protest, returning my Sitara e Imtiaz, given to me by a state that continues to abduct and torture Baloch citizens,” he wrote on X.

Hanif, a British Pakistani writer and journalist who writes a monthly opinion piece in The New York Times, was honoured with the third-highest civilian award in Pakistan in 2018.

The alleged mistreatment of the Baloch protesters, mostly women, was condemned by several including political leaders of Pakistan.

President Dr Arif Alvi and caretaker Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar also voiced concerns over the mistreatment of Baloch protesters by the Islamabad police.

During a telephonic conversation, both the office bearers said that the police should not have acted harshly against the protesters.

The protesters arrived in Islamabad on December 20 under the banner of Baloch Yakjehti Council when the Islamabad police launched a crackdown against them arresting several. The organisers of the protest alleged police of beating women protesters and children, an allegation the Islamabad police denied.

Many were later released by the police, however, the organisers of the protest alleged that the police forcefully deported the marchers from Islamabad.