Pakistan: Lahore Police abolish independent investigation wing

LAHORE: Lahore Police reintroducing 'unity of command', undoing the progress made by the organisation over the past two decades, reported The Nation. The media reports of Lahore Police mulling a change in rules to bring the investigation wing back under the purview of its operations wing are troubling. This separation was made by the Police Order 2002 twenty years ago, and for good reason.

Police forces are specialised and have the division of labour across the world for a reason--giving unfettered powers to figures of authority has not worked, reported The Nation. The proposal came as a surprise for most of the senior police officers when it was shared with them. The concerns raised indicate that this is a ploy by some of the officers to roll back progress and this must not be allowed.

The move to abolish the independent status of the investigation wing by giving ultimate powers to the divisional SPs and the station house officers (SHOs) has created unrest among the higher ranks of the police as it was also against the spirit of the Police Order 2002, reported Dawn. The fundamental restructuring and reform of police stations included complete separation of prosecution from the police by creating an independent (prosecution) service. This functional separation was also intended to develop requisite expertise and promote greater efficiency, leading to better results.

The fact that this change has been proposed at a time when there is no elected government in power and political parties are fixated on contests amongst themselves shows that this was a cynical attempt. Pakistan's police forces in particular have not indicated that they can be trusted with blanket authority in any case. Punjab Police's reputation has often suffered due to the actions of individual officials being involved in crimes, blackmail and corruption, reported The Nation.

The biggest problem in this system is definitely thana culture, where the Station House Officer is essentially the final word at a police station. Having an independent investigation wing at least allowed for this aspect to be removed from the purview of the all-powerful SHO, The Nation reported.

There is a need to move away from thana culture, and that is only possible if each police station is treated as an office for different wings of the police rather than a place where the SHO can act as judge, jury and executioner on how cases are to be processed. If anything, any changes made should be in the opposite direction--take powers away from the SHO and allow for greater specialisation, reported The Nation.

Interestingly, a group of police officers wanted to implement the proposal despite strong reservations shown by a majority of the participants of the meetings. Notably, the Police Order 2002 introduced the provision for separate investigation staff at every police station in order to bring specialisation to the police.

The independent police circles have termed the proposal an attempt to take the police back to the old era, saying as the developed world was following the concept of specialisation, a retrogressive mindset in the Punjab police was trying hard to grab powers to take decisions without any accountability, reported Dawn.