LAHORE: The shortage of funds for the police and the prosecution departments has led to ‘massive corruption’ as these departments and their officers shift the onus of the cost of investigation and prosecution to the complainants or defendants.

There are reports that the situation is much more disturbing in the Punjab Police whose investigating officers force the complainants or criminals to bear the expenses of investigation into a murder case, ranging from Rs50,000 to Rs80,000, due to non-provision of funds by the department. Similarly, no funds are being issued under the same head to the IOs in the thousands of other cases lodged under other offences, including robberies, theft, physical brawls, firing, fraud etc.

The demand of the cost of investigation for the outgoing year from the police department was Rs9.8bn but the government released only Rs210m of it, which means the public bore the whole cost of investigation into cases and the police officials got it from the complainants or defendants through corrupt means.

In the prosecution department too, there are complaints that the officers force the IOs of the police and other government departments, including forest, livestock, drug, agriculture etc, to pay them money for completion of investigations/reports.

Govt released Rs210m against Rs9.8bn demand by police, shifting the onus onto people for investigation cost

An official, privy to the situation, says around 1.1 million cases were registered with the Punjab Police’s 724 police stations during 2023 while over 30,000 cases are registered annually by the other government departments, which put enormous burden on the prosecution department to prepare challans, collect evidence and forward them to the relevant courts. About the Punjab Police, he says, the department had demanded from the government Rs9.8bn last year for the cost of investigation. On the other hand, the Punjab Prosecution Department has, for the first time, moved a summary seeking Rs1.5bn to meet the cost of prosecution.

There were 683 police stations in 2011 in Punjab and the number increased to 720 in 2020, marking an increase of 5.41pc in the number of police stations in the province. This number later increased to 724, the official says, adding that as the cases lodged by the police stations increased accordingly which left an impact on cost of investigation for the provincial police that increased to Rs9.8bn.

The Punjab Police had demanded Rs9.8bn in 2022-23 under the head of cost of investigation. Unfortunately, the official says, the Punjab government turned down its request and released only Rs270m against the required amount and the police department declared it insufficient to stop corruption prevailing at the police station level. The police high-ups were left extremely dissatisfied when the Punjab government released only Rs210m for the cost of investigation for 2023-24 against the demanded amount Rs9.8bn.

Instead of resolving the chronic crisis, the Punjab Police high-ups have been strictly directed by the government to cut down the requisite demands of funds for the cost of investigation, ignoring the serious reservations that the sufferings of the department are manifold in addressing the issues of corruption or bribery.

The official has revealed that the total annual budgetary layout of the Punjab Police is Rs187bn and 85 to 90pc of it goes to the dispensation of salaries to the employees. The remaining amount is insufficient to meet huge expenses to improve the police performance. He adds that the safe cities scheme has been the key programmes of the Punjab Police to fight terrorism, law & order and street crime in the modern era of technology. Recently, the Punjab Police have proposed a large-scale scheme to establish safe city projects in all the cities of the province and it required Rs5bn for the timely completion according to the given plan. Earlier, the safe city authorities were completed at the cost of Rs12bn in the major cities of Punjab, including Rawalpindi, Faisalabad and Gujranwala.

He further says the acute shortage of funds under the head of POL has also hit the police hard, creating another potential challenge for the high-ups when hundreds of police vehicles across the province have gone off road. Complaints have surfaced that the police employees are taking bribes from the citizens and defendants to meet the POL expenses for the raids or visits to crime scenes as well as patrolling.

Similarly, the official says, the Punjab Police was provided Rs1.3bn only for the purchase of uniform for over 250,000 employees and the department had no option but to allocate only one uniform to each employee annually, forcing them to make ‘alternate arrangements’ on their own. Resultantly, the police officials are using the ‘alternate arrangements’ as a weapon for corruption or bribe, ‘putting entire burden on the citizens’ whether it was a matter of cost of investigation, POL or police uniform or any other expenses.

About the persecution, the official source adds, the department recently has moved a summary of Rs1.5bn for the release of funds for cost of prosecution but the department high-ups are not much hopeful for release of funds as they fear that they would be treated the same way the government treated the police department.

Published in Dawn, June 3rd, 2024