Ban enforced: Over 230 arrested for pillion riding, mostly outside the city

Police enforcing the ban more strictly on outskirts of the city

ISLAMABAD: The capital police have arrested at least 234 motorbike riders and their pillion riders in a drive against pillion riding, which has been banned by the district administration until Muharram 10, for security reasons.

The district administration had on September 9 banned riding pillion on motorbikes in the city. The move was initially mooted to last for two months. However, the deputy commissioner later altered the orders and limited the ban to just the first ten days of the new Islamic year.

Police said that in wake of the directives, they had launched a campaign across the district to enforce the ban and catch pillion riders.

As a result, at least 234 motorbike riders have been arrested and formally booked for violating the ban in the past four days alone.

Deputy Commissioner Hamza Shafqaat told The Express Tribune that the ban was imposed at the request of the police as a precautionary measure to maintain peace in the city during Muharram.

Shafqaat said that it was not a blanket ban and that the police were told to exempt the elderly, the women and children from it.

The DC said a total of 197 mourning processions are expected to be taken out in the capital during Muharram.

The police drive to enforce the ban, however, is mostly limited to rural and peripheral areas of the city with most of the arrests being reported by the rural zone where there is a very high incidence of street crime as compared to main urban areas of Islamabad.

At least 148 motorcyclists were arrested by officers deputed at six police stations in the rural zone including Koral, Khanna, Shahzad Town, Nilore, Sihala and Lohi Bher until Sunday morning.

Arrests were also reported from other periphery precincts such as Golra, Tarnol, Sabzi Mandi, Noon and Shams Colony.

No case against pillion riders has been registered so far from the city precincts such as Secretariat, Aabpara, Margalla, Karachi Company, and Ramna.

A police official said the reason for stricter enforcement in the rural zone was because the crime ratio in the zone was much higher than in the rest of the capital.

Police said the drive will continue until Muharram 10 when the ban expires.

Moonshine seized

Police have seized at least 1,288 bottles of locally-made liquor in two separate raids in the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi and arrested two bootleggers.

In the first bust, Rawalpindi police said that they had followed a car, which had failed to stop at a picket in the remits of the Chauntra police station. After a brief chase, the driver abandoned the car and fled into the nearby fields.

The police said they found the abandoned car loaded with locally-made liquor. A total of 239 bottles and 649 kuppis (small bottles) were recovered from the car. A case registered against the unidentified bootleggers.

Meanwhile, in the capital, the police said they have arrested two bootleggers and recovered 400 bottles during a raid in the Mera Badi area near Sector G-11. Another 300 litres of liquor was seized during the raid.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 17^th, 2018.