LAHORE: The Punjab government on Thursday transferred the Multan regional police officer and posted him as counter terrorism department additional inspector general.

DIG Capt (retired) Muhammad Amin Wains, who served for around eight months as Multan RPO, was posted additional IG, CTD, against an existing vacancy.

The post fell vacant after the federal government required services of DIG Aftab Ahmad Cheema as Islamabad IGP. Mr Cheema remained the Additional IG, CTD, for more than six months.

The government also transferred Punjab Establishment DIG Amjad Javed Saleemi, who was recently promoted to the rank of additional IG, and posted him Multan RPO against the sanctioned post of a DIG rank officer.

A police source told Dawn that Mr Saleemi, who belongs to 14th Common of Civil Service of Pakistan, had been given a relatively junior post keeping in view the police strength of the Multan region which falls below 10,000.

He said the PML-N-led Punjab government had posted an additional IG as Multan RPO second time in the last six years or so. The source said Mr Saleemi being a senior officer in Punjab police was appointed Multan RPO, but on the other hand DG Khan RPO Rehmatullah Khan Niazi belonged to 20th Common.

He further said the government had already superseded Mr Saleemi by appointing DIG Dr Arif Mushtaq (15th Common) as additional IG (Welfare & Finance) and DIG Khaliq Dad Lak (14th Common) as additional IG (Investigation) Punjab.

Sources privy to the CTD restructuring said Mr Wains was collective choice of government, intelligence agencies and police authorities. He had better coordination with intelligence apparatus and being a former army man would be comfortable as director general of the Anti-Terrorism Force which comprised retired army officers and personnel, a source said.

They said the posting of Mr Wains also brushed aside the fears of police officers regarding appointment of an army officer or a DMG man as head of the new force.

Meanwhile, police authorities also appointed two district police officers (DPOs) against the vacancies.

According to notifications, Faisalabad SSP (Operations) Ghulam Mubashir Maken was transferred and posted Dera Ghazi Khan DPO while Commandant Ring Road Police Lahore Shakir Hussain Dawar was transferred and posted Bhakkar DPO.

SP Muhammad Nadeem, who was awaiting posting, was transferred and posted as Lahore Model Town investigation SP against a vacancy.