KARACHI, Jan 14: There are 356 police stations in Sindh —100 in Karachi and 256 in the interior of the province — housed in 233 buildings owned by the police department, 19 in rented buildings and 104 in occupied buildings.
Besides, 102 police stations in the interior are functioning without any transport facility.
Official statistics show that the number of police stations housed in occupied buildings is 36 in Larkana range, 12 in Sukkur range, three in Mirpur Khas range, 16 in Hyderabad range and 37 in Karachi range. The number of police stations with no transport facility at all are 17 in Hyderabad, 42 in Sukkur, 30 in Larkana and 13 in Mirpur Khas range.
The Sindh police department, with a total strength of 55,346, is authorized to have 5,176 vehicles, including 1,703 pickups, 274 jeeps, 145 cars, 32 ambulances, 553 trucks and buses, 89 prisoner vans, 54 vans, 31 breakdown vans and 2295 motorcycles, but it holds only 3,796 vehicles, 961 vehicles having completed 10 years of their life. So the shortfall of 1,380 vehicles has increases to 2,224.
The police force is also short of one DIG, 30 SSPs, 100 DSPs, 21 PSDPs, 663 sub-inspectors, 2,208 assistant sub-inspectors, 124 head constables and 4,626 constables against its sanctioned strength. The posts are lying vacant due to ban on recruitment, which has recently been lifted by the government.
The statistics show that in the past two years a total of 572 criminal cases have been registered against police officials in Sindh. These include one superintendent of police, one deputy superintendent of police, seven inspectors, 62 sub-inspectors, 87 assistant sub-inspectors, 97 head constables and 317 constables.
In the same period, 8,926 police officials were awarded major punishments: 21 inspectors, 156 SIs, 274 ASIs, 366 head constables and 2,483 constables had either been dismissed, removed or compulsorily retired from service and rank.
Salaries of 297 inspectors, 997 SIs, 1,596 ASIs, 506 head constables and 2,230 constables had been reduced. The number of minor punishments stood at 56,378.— PPI
