Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The Senate was informed on Friday that during the last three years 1389 vehicles and 884 motorcycles were stolen from the federal capital’s jurisdiction with a recovery rate of almost 20 per cent.

The Minister of State for Interior, Baleeghur Rehman informed the House during the question hour that out of 1389 stolen vehicles 291 were recovered and in case of motorcycles 147 were recovered out of a total 884 stolen bikes.

Giving details, the minister said, 766 vehicles were stolen in 2014 of which 149 were recovered, 369 vehicles were stolen in 2015 of which 369 were recovered and in 2016 as many as 254 vehicles were stolen of which 59 were recovered.

Similarly, he said, in 2014 total 442 motorcycles were stolen out of which 65 were recovered, in 2015 total 263 motorcycles were stolen of which 42 were recovered and in 2016 total 179 motorcycles were stolen of which 40 were recovered.

“These figures show an improvement in the law and order situation as the theft or stealing incidents have declined during the past few years while recovery the ratio has improved,” he added.

He mentioned to various measures like distribution of awareness pamphlets, installation of safety alarms, establishing security posts at all exit points, enhancing patrolling and surprise checking, introducing a chit system at important and crowded parking places, deployment of personnel in “Civvies” and directing the SHOs to personally supervise all initiatives, starting actions against vagabonds and installation of CCTV cameras.

He further stated that a list had been prepared of previous convicts and distributed among all quarters to interrogate them during the investigation of car theft cases.

Answering another question, the minister said, there was no government driving school in the federal capital. However, there are seven private driving schools registered under the Motor Vehicle Rules 1969 that have been issued certificates of ‘School of Motoring’ after inspection by the Inspection Committee of Islamabad Traffic Police (ITP).

He also informed that safe City project and the CCTV cameras installed under this project were helping the law enforcing agencies to check crimes and identify the criminals. When asked about the quality of CCTV cameras, the minister said, the present system was functioning well. However, more efficient and higher resolution cameras could also be installed as there is always room for improvement.

Police arrest drug dealer: After an encounter, the police has arrested a drug dealer from Doray, the suburb village of the federal capital and recovered arms and narcotics from his possession.

On a tip off Tarnol Police raided the village Doray on Friday, which has become the hub of drug selling, but an influential drug dealer opened firing on the police. First of all the police force ran towards safe shelters to save their lives. Then they called the headquarters for sending more official for their assistance. After some time the additional force reached there.

After the police started retaliation, the drug dealers managed to escape from the scene. However the police arrested their one cohort Umar Farooq and recovered charas and a 9mm rifle from his possession. The police sources told this scribe that the arrested person works for a major drug dealer of the area Raees Khan. Police has registered the case No 58/2017 against the accued Umar.

The police sources said that some powerful persons at the village are in the dirty business of narcotics trade since long as they sent consignments of millions of rupees to different areas of the twin cities Rawalpindi and Islamabad on a daily basis. Some years ago the police had tried to conduct an operation here, but the powerful smugglers killed two police officials by subjecting them to torture.