Security fears close open courts
For Shabana Kausar, this was her last chance to get justice.
LAHORE:
For Shabana Kausar, this was her last chance to get justice. Two years and a lengthy legal battle after her divorce, the courts had ordered her ex-husband to return her dowry to her. But Fasialabad police were refusing to help, even though they had registered two FIRs against her ex-husband, an influential patwari. And he was now making threatening phone calls demanding that she stop making a fuss.
So Kausar bought a bus ticket to Lahore and stood outside the Central Police Office (CPO), clad in a black burqa under a searing morning sun, hoping to get some help from Punjab’s top policeman, IGP Tariq Saleem Dogar. She wasn’t even allowed inside. Dozens of other complainants paced around outside the IGP’s office on Church Road, similarly denied entry.
Traditionally, kutcheries, or open courts, give ordinary citizens the chance to bring their plight directly to the attention of powerful senior officials like the IGP. But the IG is no longer holding such courts because of security concerns, thus cutting off access for people who often have nowhere else to go.
“I was told I could only go in if an official inside the CPO gives my name at the gate,” Kausar told The Express Tribune. “I don’t know what I’m going to do now.” She said this was the second time she had been turned away from the CPO.
Dogar used to hold kutcheries twice a week after he was sworn in as IGP on April 27, 2009. But he has held just two in Lahore in the last six months, the latest being on April 6 at Hazoori Bagh. On that day, he suspended one SHO after hearing complaints about him, and announced a cash reward of Rs20,000 for another SHO after hearing praise for him, in a demonstration of the quick and decisive action available at such open courts. It is this sort of action that Kausar and countless others hope for.
A Punjab Police spokesman said that the format of kutcheries had to be changed because of security concerns. People can no longer present their applications to the IGP in person, he said, but he still looks at and addresses such applications. He said the IGP had held a series of kutcheries in other cities in Punjab in recent weeks so that people didn’t have to come all the way to Lahore to get their complaints heard.
Between April 8 and June 23, 16 kutcheries were held in Chiniot, Toba Tek Singh, Pakpattan, Bahawalnagar, Sahiwal, Rahim Yar Khan, Dera Ghazi Khan, Faisalabad, Lodhran, Khanewal, Vehari, Multan, Muzaffargarh and Layyah.
But the last kutchery was held over a month ago on June 23, and people still stream to the CPO from all over the province looking for help. And Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif has repeatedly told senior officials of police and other departments to hold regular open courts, most recently in orders dated April 11, 2010. He said open courts also served an important function in monitoring the performance of the police department, and that redressing people’s complaints at their doorsteps was the government’s top priorities.
Given her own bitter personal experience, Kausar does not believe him. “They make lots of hollow statements in the media, but in practical terms things are quite the contrary.”
Published in The Express Tribune, August 3rd, 2010.
For Shabana Kausar, this was her last chance to get justice. Two years and a lengthy legal battle after her divorce, the courts had ordered her ex-husband to return her dowry to her. But Fasialabad police were refusing to help, even though they had registered two FIRs against her ex-husband, an influential patwari. And he was now making threatening phone calls demanding that she stop making a fuss.
So Kausar bought a bus ticket to Lahore and stood outside the Central Police Office (CPO), clad in a black burqa under a searing morning sun, hoping to get some help from Punjab’s top policeman, IGP Tariq Saleem Dogar. She wasn’t even allowed inside. Dozens of other complainants paced around outside the IGP’s office on Church Road, similarly denied entry.
Traditionally, kutcheries, or open courts, give ordinary citizens the chance to bring their plight directly to the attention of powerful senior officials like the IGP. But the IG is no longer holding such courts because of security concerns, thus cutting off access for people who often have nowhere else to go.
“I was told I could only go in if an official inside the CPO gives my name at the gate,” Kausar told The Express Tribune. “I don’t know what I’m going to do now.” She said this was the second time she had been turned away from the CPO.
Dogar used to hold kutcheries twice a week after he was sworn in as IGP on April 27, 2009. But he has held just two in Lahore in the last six months, the latest being on April 6 at Hazoori Bagh. On that day, he suspended one SHO after hearing complaints about him, and announced a cash reward of Rs20,000 for another SHO after hearing praise for him, in a demonstration of the quick and decisive action available at such open courts. It is this sort of action that Kausar and countless others hope for.
A Punjab Police spokesman said that the format of kutcheries had to be changed because of security concerns. People can no longer present their applications to the IGP in person, he said, but he still looks at and addresses such applications. He said the IGP had held a series of kutcheries in other cities in Punjab in recent weeks so that people didn’t have to come all the way to Lahore to get their complaints heard.
Between April 8 and June 23, 16 kutcheries were held in Chiniot, Toba Tek Singh, Pakpattan, Bahawalnagar, Sahiwal, Rahim Yar Khan, Dera Ghazi Khan, Faisalabad, Lodhran, Khanewal, Vehari, Multan, Muzaffargarh and Layyah.
But the last kutchery was held over a month ago on June 23, and people still stream to the CPO from all over the province looking for help. And Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif has repeatedly told senior officials of police and other departments to hold regular open courts, most recently in orders dated April 11, 2010. He said open courts also served an important function in monitoring the performance of the police department, and that redressing people’s complaints at their doorsteps was the government’s top priorities.
Given her own bitter personal experience, Kausar does not believe him. “They make lots of hollow statements in the media, but in practical terms things are quite the contrary.”
Published in The Express Tribune, August 3rd, 2010.