Cleaning Karachi: SC assured that door-to-door drive for illegal weapons will start soon

Bench displeased that 19-year-old cache of weapons still not disposed of .

KARACHI: The law enforcement agencies will start a door-to-door drive for recovery of illegal arms since the deadline for surrendering such weapons had expired and only 19 guns were collected, Sindh advocate general Khalid Javed Khan told the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

He conceded before the apex court’s larger bench, which was hearing the Karachi law and order suo motu case at the Karachi registry, that the first phase of the campaign had yielded no positive results as citizens did not come forward.  He, however, expressed confidence that the second phase would be more successful.

The law

The Surrender of Illicit Arms Act 1991 empowers law enforcers to get publicised notices, asking the citizens to deposit the weapons they possess unlawfully to avoid legal action.

Once the deadline of a certain period expires, the law enforcers can forcibly recover the illegal weapons from citizens. For this purpose, door-to-door raids can be conducted, while curfew can also be imposed in certain localities to make it a success.

On September 27, the home department had issued public notices on the directives of the apex court which had taken serious notice of the inaction on the part of the provincial authorities. During the 14-day deadline, from September 27 to October 12, only 19 guns were deposited with the authorities.

In 2011, the Supreme Court had noted with concern that illicit arms were one of the main reasons behind lawlessness in the city, where hundreds of people were falling prey to the senseless targeted killings.

The apex court had thus ordered the provincial government to cleanse the city of illicit arms by launching a de-weaponisation campaign.

Rusting arms cache

The apex court also directed the chief collector customs prevention Nasir Masroor to submit a detailed report regarding the large number of smuggled arms and ammunitions that have been lying at the port premises since 1994.

The bench was visibly upset when it came to know that a large cache confiscated 19 years ago had yet to be disposed of.

The one-man commission, appointed by the SC to investigate the DG Rangers allegations regarding a missing shipload of arms and ammunitions, had conducted inquiry to see whether the weapons were smuggled through the sea and the role of customs authorities in the scam.

According to the commission's report, a large number of weapon consignments smuggled into the country back in 1994 were confiscated by the authorities.

"The cache of arms is still lying on the port premises in the custody of the Karachi Port Trust," the chief collector confirmed the commission's report. "We are sitting on a volcano," remarked the bench, citing that the whole city was full of these illicit arms and ammunitions and drugs. "But none is ready to take up the responsibility," they added.

The customs authorities were directed to submit a report about the number of arms seized on Thursday (today), when the matter would be taken up again.