Daily Times

Last year, police officials, including DSP, SHO, ASI and some police constables were brutally killed in two encounters with gangs of criminals during search operations in the riverine area of the district Shikarpur in July and August.

The operations were conducted to recover the kidnapped people. But due to some inevitable reasons, the police could not recover the kidnapped people and had to run away from the spot after the officials were killed. It seems the police in Sindh has become toothless before criminals.

Shockingly, a war-like situation always prevails in the riverine areas in interior Sindh as the areas are overwhelmed by gangs of outlaws. As many of the outlaws are a creation of tribal clashes, therefore, they enjoy complete help and support from their tribes.

The criminals own rocket launchers and sophisticated and damaging weapons. To move into the areas, police personnel generally use Armoured Personnel Carriers (APCs). This time, the vehicles could not protect their lives.

During the two operations, the officials were killed in APCs as rocket launchers and bullets pierced through the bodies of the APCs and hit the occupants.

Because of some black sheep, the department has completely failed to establish the writ of the state in Sindh’s riverine areas

It shows that the killings of police personnel happened due to the use of heavy weaponry by the criminals and the substandard APCs used by the police. The two phenomena are the substantial question mark for the police intelligence and the individuals involved in purchasing the poor quality APCs. Certainly, the sophisticated and heavy arms and ammunition, which the criminals possess, are not manufactured by them but these may have been bought from anywhere. It will be erroneousness to say that intelligence agencies including police intelligence operating in the country are ignorant of it.

After the killings of junior police officers in APCs, the then Inspector General of Police (IGP) Sindh had ordered an inquiry to check the quality of the APCs but the inquiry not unlike many past inquiries failed to solve the problem. Regrettably, neither poor quality APC vehicles were substituted with perfect quality APC cars nor the individuals and organizations involved in the procurement of these substandard APC vehicles were discovered and held responsible and accountable. It shows that the inefficiency, dishonesty and corruption epidemically prevail in the organization. This is because of this that the Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported in 2016 that in Pakistan, the police is the most abusive, corrupt and unaccountable institution of the state.

It looks that over time, Pakistan’s criminal justice system has been worsening as it has not been performing its role effectively to improve the prevailing internal security conditions. Police is the key component of the justice system, which is responsible for establishing and maintaining law and order. Yet, because of the existence of some black sheep, the department has completely failed to establish the writ of the state in Sindh’s riverine areas where the law and order situation has been worst and people of the areas have been left to the mercy of the criminals. The law and order situation in these areas has deteriorated to such an extent that police have become incapable of even defending themselves from the criminals. Thus, criminals have been extorting citizens with no fear. They threaten people if they refuse to give money, they would be kidnapped, robbed and killed. Perforce, people have been regularly paying money to dacoits of their areas for the protection and security of their life, personal property and business.

Police’s failure in many of the operations against criminals and the maintenance of law and order in numerous parts of the country is because of the lack of integrity, spirit and gallantry in most of the senior police officers, and the shortage of latest weaponry in possession of police personnel. One of my police officer friends told that many of the assistant Superintendents of police (ASPs) and senior superintendents of police (SSPs) physically don’t take part in encounters. They only stringently instruct deputy superintendents of police (DSPs) or station house officers (SHOs) to take the commanding positions.

Politicians have been blamed to interfere and obstruct the performance of police, and patronize criminals. In reality, many of the police authorities have developed associations with politicians to get their vested interests. Thus, the officers willingly get involved in the offensive activities on the behest of politicians with whom they are in a relationship. Some senior police officers enjoy high respect and esteem of the general public for making sincere and dedicated efforts to protect and serve the common people.

The police system is in desperate need of all-inclusive reforms to make the force refurbished, authoritative, trustworthy and administratively autonomous institution. To empower the institution to provide people with protection and security of their life, property and business, police personnel should be given training on how to fight criminals and to achieve success in operations. The force needs to be equipped with up-to-date and heavy weaponry.

The operations are to be commanded by senior police officers.

The writer is an academic, and can be reached on Twitter @ARShykh