Strategic shift: the deadly police encounters in Lahore

A recent incident took place under suspicious circumstances as suspect was reportedly handcuffed

LAHORE: Lahore Police has once again brought a shift in its crime fighting strategy which may not appease all.

A senior police officer shared this view while mentioning the death of a suspected robber in an encounter with the investigations wing of the Lahore Anti-Organised Crime Cell (CIA) in Batapur last week.

The suspect was allegedly involved in the murder of a trader who had tried to resist a robbery in Akbari Gate area a few days back.

The investigations wing was involved in an encounter after a lapse of at least one and a half years. During the period, there were few encounters but most of them were held by the patrolling squads of the operations wing.

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The recent encounter took place under suspicious circumstances as the suspect was reportedly handcuffed when he was shot. The CIA team shared its ‘formula’ story that the suspect was killed by the firing of other suspects during a raid.

Similar formula stories were heard from the police over a long period of time regarding their encounters with ‘dangerous’ suspects.

The CIA squad of the investigations wing of Lahore Police was once notoriously known as the death squad as stories of dangerous criminals’ elimination in encounters surfaced every other day. Some controversies regarding such encounters have also come into the limelight.

One of the infamous encounters was that in Sabzazar in which two brothers were gunned down alongside three suspects allegedly at the whim of a senior bureaucrat closely linked to the then Punjab chief minister (CM). Later on, the encounter was dubbed dubious.

Former CIA deputy superintendent of police (DSP) Umer Virk along with the CM was booked for the suspicious encounter.

Later on, Virk was promoted to the rank of superintendent of police (SP) in the CIA. During his tenure, a particularly large number of encounters were reported during daytime in crowded areas and during the night in desolate localities.

Hue and cry from the deceased suspects’ families as well as human rights activists fell on deaf ears.

The recurrent pattern of encounters by the CIA was observed with brief intervals after Virk was removed from the office of the SP following a Supreme Court order regarding out of turn promotions.

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In June 2018, when BA Nasir took charge as capital city police officer (CCPO) of Lahore, he introduced a zero-tolerance policy for extra-judicial killings as well as custodial deaths. He remained on the post till November last year, during which miraculously no raid was conducted by the CIA investigations wing for recovery in which a suspected robber was killed due to firing by other suspects.

Punjab Police has a very tainted image when it comes to extra-judicial killings amid other brutalities and the criminal justice system overruling it and preventing bringing those involved in illegalities to book is not a viable option.

Some experts hold the opinion that the judicial inquiry mandatory for each custodial as well encounter death did not prove very effective as there have been very rare instances when it was completed and an official was held accountable.

As far as the question arises whether encounters proved fruitful in curbing crime, an objective analysis may help derive an answer.