Karachi violence case: 30% of Karachi policemen terrorist sympathisers, says IG

"Whenever a case with a political affiliation comes, action is taken but nobody is ready to register a FIR,"...

KARACHI:

Alluding to the Supreme Court’s criticism of inherent weaknesses in police investigations, the Sindh police chief confessed on Friday that an incomplete FIR had led to exoneration of alleged attackers.

The terrorists, Sindh Inspector-General of Police (IGP) Wajid Ali Durrani said, were involved in an attack on a bus carrying policemen in Korangi. “Thirty per cent of the police force sympathises with them [criminals],” he claimed.

The IGP was testifying before a five-member bench of the Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, which is hearing a suo motu case into a horrific spell of violence in Karachi. The bench had earlier ripped apart the Sindh police’s handling of the investigations into the massacre in the metropolis, where over 400 people died in three months.

“This is one of the operational problems that we face,” Durrani said. “Whenever a case with a political affiliation comes to the fore, action is taken but nobody is ready to register a FIR.”

“Time and again, the court has extended its support to the police to take non-discriminatory action against terrorists, extortionists, kidnappers and mafias,” Justice Chaudhry said. “Bring a qualitative change in your force.” In a surprise move, Durrani described himself as ‘a powerless IGP’.

“Under the Police Order of 2002, considerable powers were given to the provincial police officer (PPO) but the Sindh Assembly repealed that order. [Now] I can only appoint and transfer officers up till the level of deputy superintendent of police. If I have to remove a senior superintendent of police, I have to make a request to the provincial home minister,” he said.

Then you cannot be held accountable for failures of your department, observed Justice Sarmad Jalal Osmany.

“The order has a constitutional guarantee. It is a protected ordinance and open to judicial scrutiny only,” the CJ observed.

The bench then specifically inquired about the bus attack, an alleged abduction, targeted killings and recovery of a body from a gunny bag, and if the IGP was aware that two main accused were exonerated by the administrative judge of an anti-terrorism court of Karachi.

(Read: Supreme Court on Karachi violence)

When the case was brought before an anti-terrorism court, the witnesses to the arrest retracted their statements and said they had only testified under a SHO’s pressure. “Have you suspended him as you suspended the investigating officer?” the CJ asked.

“What action was taken against police officers when this came to your knowledge?” asked Justice Amir Hani Muslim.

The bench then asked the IGP about officers who had gotten ‘shoulder promotions’. But as Durrani tried to evade the question, the bench told him that about 900 officers had been promoted unfairly.

The bench pointed out a Supreme Court judgment, which requires removal of these officers. All provinces have implemented it except Sindh, the bench said.

Assistant Inspector-General (legal) Anwar Subhani, assisting the IGP said that a Supreme Court bench has held the order in abeyance in an appeal filed by affected officers.

The bench told him to file an application before the deputy registrar. so that it can call the file and look into it at the next hearing on September 13.

“The message that the people are getting is that police is capable but shies away (from fulfilling its responsibilities),” the CJ said. “Police officers are either incompetent or dishonest,” said Justice Muslim.

(Read: Solving Karachi troubles)

Babar Awan speaks

While the Supreme Court conducted its hearing, former law minister Babar Awan said that judges and generals cannot interfere with executive authority.

“Any such incursion will be a violation of the constitution and attracts Article 6 of the constitution (high treason),” Awan said in an informal talk with reporters covering the suo motu proceedings.

Soon after the proceedings were adjourned, Awan invited the press corps for tea and had a talk in the bar room of the Supreme Court’s Karachi Registry.

“People are killed in packed courtrooms in Punjab. Can a judge in whose court a person is killed be held responsible for the killing? Similarly, the federation cannot be held responsible for killings in Karachi or any other part of the country,” he said in an apparent reference to repeated observations by the court that prima facie, the government and its machinery has failed in protecting lives and properties of its citizens and thus fundamental rights of people are being violated.

“It does not matter if people call us cowards…We will not abandon our policy of reconciliation,” Awan said. “Only a political solution can solve problems. A religious or judicial decree cannot bring people closer.”

Before the Supreme Court took notice of the situation, parliament took note, he said. “Exercising the executive authority is the sole prerogative of the elected representatives of the people of Pakistan.”





(Read: Startling remarks)

Published in The Express Tribune, September 10^th, 2011.