THIS is with reference to the article ‘Police reforms: missed opportunity’ (Feb 13). In my professional view, the issue is not as simple as it appears. One has to understand why the provincial governments ignored the implementation of Police Order 2002 and its sequel, the report ‘Police reforms: way forward’. This was so because the report had been drafted by the same set of close and friendly Police Service of Pakistan (PSP) officers who had earlier been tasked by the Musharraf government to prepare the draft of Police Order 2002.
The conspiracy was to create a king’s party loyal to the president in each district that was to be led by a district nazim. The district nazims were lured into joining the king’s party by placing police under them, instead of the deputy commissioners, who were re-designated as district coordination officers (DCOs) with no powers over police.
While obliging the president, this group wreaked their own bias against the District Management Group (DMG) and the cadre of provincial ‘ranker’ officers. In reward thereof, they freed themselves of the democratic supervision of the provincial governments. When democracy got restored, the provincial governments bounced back and disowned the Police Order 2002. The provinces discarded the system and the plethora of toothless public safety commissions, a novel idea imported from Japanese criminal justice system.
No country in the world except Pakistan has adopted the Japanese model of policing. That is the context of non-implementation of the so-called reforms, and the reasons are obvious.
The 2002 Police Order was touted as capable of creating a modern police, replacing the Irish constabulary model of the Police Act 1861. But this was a false propaganda. The model was unchanged. As for modernisation, nothing changed at all. At the police stations, the poor citizenry continued facing what they had been facing all along. Actually, the police force deteriorated in the total absence of any external accountability whatsoever.
In India, our colonial cousins, the states (provinces) have passed new Police Acts after 2006, but with transparent intentions. The new Police Acts have retained the key feature of inbuilt external accountability mechanism of magisterial inquests by the deputy commissioners and the magistracy in the 175 years old time-tested Police Act 1861. But, an even more effective, powerful and independent external police oversight mechanism, called the Police Complaints Authority (PCA), has been introduced at district and state levels. This PCA is akin to the Civilian Complaint Review Board in New York City.
This, or something similar, is what we need to be focussing on as we go forward.
Rafi Pervaiz Bhatti
Former PSP officer
Lahore
Published in Dawn, March 18th, 2026
