SWABI: Over 870 closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras have been installed at the entry, exit and other strategic points of the Swabi district to keep an eye on the movement of militants and other criminal elements and maintain peace in the region, sources in the police department told Dawn here on Saturday.

They said 88 CCTV cameras had been installed in the district headquarters, 150 at key points, 238 in district control room and other locations and 398 at prominent places along the roads.

They said installation of modern cameras at the entry and exit points of the district would help the police monitor movement of militants and other criminal elements round-the-clock.

The sources said cameras had also been installed at Shaheed Baba checkpost, the entry with Haripur district. They added cameras installed at the police assistant lines had the facility of automatic number plate recognition, thus helping the police trace outlaws exiting the district in an emergency.

However, an official on condition of anonymity told Dawn that CCTV cameras had yet to be installed at the entry point with Buner district, which is situated north of Swabi. He said installation of cameras at this point was vital because when militancy peaked in Swat, terrorists of banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan had taken control of the checkpost situated on the Buner side of the border.

BODY RECOVERED:

The police recovered body of a teenager from a field here on Saturday.

Said Amin Shah, father of the deceased, Mukarram Shah, 15, told the police that his son had gone out of his home a day earlier, but did not return. He said he was informed by relatives that Mukarram’s body was lying in fields. He said when he reached there a pistol was also lying beside his son’s body.

He said they had no enmity with anyone.

The police registered an FIR and started investigations.

Campaign launched

The Swabi Action Committee has reiterated its demand that the government should give locals rebate in electricity bills and revive the Gadoon Amazai Industrial Estate.

The SAC, which was formed recently to highlight issues of local people, has launched a campaign to push for revival of Gadoon estate, and provision of funds out of tobacco taxation and royalty on electricity produced from Tarbela and Ghazi Barotha dams for executing development projects in Swabi.

Nadeem Shah, SAC president, regretted that the government had to yet to give tobacco the status of a crop, which abundantly produced in KP, and that Pakistan Tobacco Board had utterly failed to work for the rights of tobacco growers.

Salim Khan Advocate, a member of SAC core vigilance committee, claimed industrialists from Punjab and Sindh imported machinery with 100 per cent tax exemption in the name of Gadoon Industrial Estate, but later shifted the same to their industries in Lahore and Karachi.

Published in Dawn, October 29th, 2023