Fighting corruption: 41 policemen punished for involvement in criminal activities

Punishment includes cut in salaries, stoppage of annual increment and termination from the services

KARACHI: Forty-one policemen were punished on Tuesday on the charges of misuse of power, dereliction from duty, corruption and involvement in criminal activities. 

The punishments included cut in salaries, stoppage of annual increment, terminations and dismissal from the services. Thirteen officers have been dismissed from service, 10 demoted to lower ranks, 10 received a reduction in pay and 8 were given major punishments.

The punished officers consist of policemen ranking from constable to sub-inspector and include three former SHOs- Naveed Nasir, Abdul Moeed and Ejaz Rajper.

These policemen were posted in various police stations of the District West. They were punished by the District West police chief SSP Ghulam Azhar Mahesar.

"In my district, there were a total of 41 corrupt policemen and I have punished them all," said Mahesar. "Their names were produced before an apex committee meeting," he added.

Mahesar said that there are two lists - one prepared recently by the then Rapid Response Force DIG Dr Aftab Pathan and the other one was prepared a couple of years ago on the orders of apex court. "Interestingly, a majority of the policemen in both the lists were the same," he explained.

"The SSP-rank officer can punish an inspector rank and I punished all of them using my powers," he said. The policemen who have been punished have the right to appeal to their superiors, he added.

A day before Eid, three former SHOs - Ismail Lashari, Ishaq Lashari and Shaikh Shoaib-were dismissed from service following their criminal record while nine SHOs - Naveed Nasir, Muhammad Haroon Korai, Mazhar Iqbal Awan, Fasihuz Zaman, Azhar Iqbal, Amanullah, Azam Khan, Rana Khushi Muhammad and Abdul Moeed-were removed from their posts.

This action was taken by the former Karachi police chief, AIG Ghulam Qadir Thebo, following the involvement of policemen in crimes including target killings, robberies, street crimes, extortion, land grabbing and narcotics.

The widespread punishment of police officials followed an internal inquiry conducted by the Sindh police department, which has identified more than 50 SHOs involved in cases of crime while nearly 500 police officials ranking from constable to DSP.

The report declared 55 police station chiefs unfit for the post because of their involvement in criminal activities.

A senior police official said that all the corrupt police officials will be punished for negligence of their duty. "We cannot punish them all because massive reshuffling will obviously disturb the police structure," he said.

"We will punish them all but phase-wise," said an office privy to the developments. "The re-scrutiny is also being conducted, especially for the SHOs, and then more SHOs will also be punished as per their involvements," he added.

The move has started working already and better results are expected within the next couple of months, the police officials told The Express Tribune.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 22^nd, 2015.