RAHIM YAR KHAN: The ratio of crime in south Punjab is less as compared to the upper parts of the province, said Additional Inspector General (AIG) Inam Ghani at a press conference at the district press club here on Wednesday.

The AIG posted to the southern region said he had been appointed to make rules and regulations for the police force here. He said paperwork had been completed by the task force headed by inspectors general of Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan for the elimination of crime from the riverside kacha area with the coordination of the army, and later intelligence-based operations will be conducted here. The writ of the state will be established with rule of law, he stressed.

The front desks at police stations will be empowered to ensure smooth and hassle-free registration of cases. The attitude of police personnel would be changed through introspection and psychologists engaged while recruiting new employees to assess their attitude.

The AIG claimed that the police force will be enhanced and police stations monitored through technology. He added that there were 180,000 uniformed police personnel in the entire Punjab province and if one-third of the force was reserved for south Punjab, the number should come down to 60,000. But there were only 27,000 police in the region. There was one policeman for 570 people in upper Punjab, but in south Punjab there was one cop for 1,580 people, he added.

Answering a question, Mr Ghani said that his priority was to work for the rights of the south Punjab police. The police of this region was running two schools in the kacha area to educate local children, which was actually the job of the education department.

Regarding narcotics control, the AIG said the Anti-Narcotics Force and the excise department were responsible for controlling drug trafficking in Rahim Yar Khan.

Published in Dawn, August 27th, 2020