IG told to establish reporting centre to hear complaints

Reporting centre to be established for complaints for which police stations refuse to register an FIR.

KARACHI:

The Sindh High Court (SHC) has directed the Sindh police chief to set up a centralised reporting centre where people can lodge complaints if police stations refuse to register an FIR.

“It may be publicised in the media and the press widely to help all such people,” ordered SHC Chief Justice Mushir Alam while heading the bench.

The order came following complaints made by most of the petitioners, who approached the high court against missing persons.They alleged that the law enforcers had taken their relatives into custody illegally, but officials at the relevant police stations neither disclose the detainees’ whereabouts nor do they entertain their pleas to register FIRs.

The judges, who had been listening to such complaints for months, finally ordered the IG to establish a centralised reporting centre to lodge public complaints. “The centre will be equipped with computers, internet to register out FIR via email,” ordered Justice Alam.

Sindh police’s law officer Ali Sher Jakhrani was ordered to place a report on the establishment of these centres in the court at the next hearing.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 3^rd, 2013.