E-policing in Peshawar

KARACHI:

The e-policing project has been functional in Peshawar for the last eight months. According to a police official from Peshawar, they investigate cases that have been registered online and also have been provided with smart phones which makes their job easy as they are connected with the main server of the police stations. Being connected to the main server means that policemen can look up criminal records within minutes.

What about Karachi?

The e-policing project was approved for Karachi back in 2008 at a cost of nearly Rs940 million and was supposed to be completed in three years. While the project is still in its initial stages - the networking systems have been installed at 45 police stations and are running on an experimental basis since 2012. The men at these police stations have been through data-entry training courses and know how to register FIRs on a computer. They, however, did not seem to be happy with the project.“Some officials told us from the start that this will become a burden,” said an ASI from a police station in District South. “This project has given all of us a migraine. Instead of fighting crime, we spend most of our day maintaining FIRs in the book and computer.”

By the end of 2012, the Sindh police had expected that networking would be complete at all police station and they could start registering computerised FIRs.  “Lack of technical support and finances are the main causes of delay in this project,” said a source at the police department.

Police officials believe that the government should have hired technical staff to run the e-policing project. “Do you think a policeman who has a Kalashnikov over his shoulder for 12 hours a day will be able to deal with IT matters?”

Published in The Express Tribune, December 17^th, 2014.