RAWALPINDI: The Rawalpindi police have only arrested 1pc of all their proclaimed offenders, the lowest arrest percentage in the entire province.

During a recent video conference with regional police officers (RPO), city police officers (CPO) and district police officers (DPO), Inspector General of Police (IGP) Punjab Shoaib Dastagir said the police’s performance regarding the recovery of stolen items in robbery cases is only 6pc, which he said was “distressingly low” and was “dragging the average of the whole Rawalpindi region down”.

Mr Dastagir added: “As the recovery of property is a common weak area of the region, therefore the Rawalpindi RPO needs to work on it.”

RPO Suhail Habib Tajik, CPO Mohammad Ahsan Younas, and the DPOs of Attock, Jhelum and Chakwal attended the meeting.

According to sources, Mr Dastagir directed the additional inspector general of police Special Branch to determine why no FIRs were registered for firing into the air by the Rawalpindi police.

“Is it a case of passive action or strict control on incidents if aerial firing,” he asked, and added that a completed report should be submitted to the IGP office by June 15.

Pointing towards Mr Younas, he also said that there were eight robbery with murder cases in the district in 2020. Mr Younas said that complete charges were sent to the courts in four of these cases and incomplete ones in the other four, to which Mr Dastagir said that those cases should be finalised soon as well.

Mr Dastagir also directed Mr Younas to look into 10 cancelled carried-forward cases of dacoity and determine whether they were rightly cancelled.

“Almost 77pc of the accused involved in robbery cases in 2020 in Rawalpindi district are at large,” Mr Dastagir said, adding that Mr Younas needed to pick up the pace to arrest the remaining suspects.

He also pointed out that there was no striking progress in the recovery of vehicles stolen in Rawalpindi and Attock since the last RPOs conference. However, Chakwal has improved with regard to the arrest of suspects in vehicle theft cases, he said.

He said 74pc of suspects wanted for vehicle thefts in Rawalpindi district are at large, and with the exception of Attock all other districts have not been able to catch up to the baseline target.

He added that Rawalpindi has the lowest arrest percentage in Punjab with just 1pc of their total proclaimed offenders arrested.

Mr Dastagir said cases filed must be looked into by the Attock DPO, as only seven new proclaimed offenders were added in April.

He also criticised police action against kite flying, noting that 744 FIRs are registered against kite flyers in Rawalpindi district. He said unless effective action is taken against the manufacturers of kites and string, the district will always remain behind the curve.

The Attock administrative dashboard showed that only two show-cause notices were issued, Mr Dastagir said. He asked the Attock DPO if there were no delinquent acts done by police officials

He also criticised Chakwal and Attock for not obtaining their data for a formal inspection.

Saying that vehicle theft was a staple crime of Rawalpindi district, Mr Dastagir directed the Rawalpindi RPO to expedite the progress of legal transfer of habitual receivers of stolen vehicles from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to Punjab. He said if there is a legal issue, a letter may be sent to the Punjab CPO that can be taken up at a higher forum.

A Rawalpindi police spokesperson said the police arrested 51 proclaimed offenders in category A and 498 in category B in April-May.

Published in Dawn, June 15th, 2020