As the city’s police force finds itself caught by unhappy protesting crowds on one side, and exploding improvised explosive devices on the other, senior police officials have instead proposed an additional layer of bureaucracy.
They have submitted a proposal to the home department to let them carve the volatile Lyari area into the sixth district of the city. The city currently has five districts. Each comprises multiple police divisions. District South has four of them: Lyari, Saddar, Clifton and City. Each of these divisions is headed by an officer with the rank of an SP or a DSP. A total of 26 police stations are spread among these four divisions in district South.
Law enforcers have now proposed to bunch Lyari and City divisions into a sixth district, which would be known as the Lyari district. DIG Shahid Hayat, the chief police officer in district South, would also be in charge of Lyari. Other senior police officials are also managing multiple districts of the city, including DIG Aleem Jaffery, who is heading districts East and Malir, and DIG Javed Odho districts Central and West.
Sindh Revenue Minister Jam Mehtab Dahar told The Express Tribune that he was not been consulted over the measure. A few senior police officials feared that the new set up would not change anything when it came to the force’s operational capabilities.
Another strange part of the proposal includes assigning six officers with the rank of an SSP to act as “middlemen” between the district police chiefs and the divisional police chiefs. The move has supposedly been made to facilitate communication between different tiers of the police force.
However, sources in the police department as well as the government told The Express Tribune that they were confident that the home department would soon approve the proposal for the formation of the Lyari district. Sindh police spokesperson SSP Imran Shaukat confirmed that the proposal for forming the Lyari district might be “approved within two or three days”. However, officials belonging to Lyari and City divisions were not aware about the ongoing developments. A senior police official said on the condition of anonymity that he had heard rumours, but no one had approached him.
Better surveillance tools
Nearly 20 police mobiles in the city have already been equipped with close circuit cameras and tracking devices, while another 60 would soon have them as well, said SSP Shaukat. “After receiving a complaint, we would track the nearest available police mobile and dispatch it to the area.”
Published in The Express Tribune, January 30th, 2013.