KARACHI, July 12: The fact that the law clearly prohibits the police from being involved in civil cases as such cases do not come within their purview often fails to keep police officials from abusing their powers to settle civil disputes out of court. This is particularly true in property cases in which the police coerce on of the parties into accepting an out of court settlement.

What happened to Idrees Ahmed recently is a case in point. 70-year old Idrees was rather brutally forced to settle a dispute of property. He was harassed and abused when he told the police that the case was pending in a court concerned and, being a civil case, could not be resolved at a police station. Not being able to bear the rude behaviour of the police he suffered a heart attack.

Idrees Ahmed was already depressed as his daughter, who was married to Nadeem in January 2001, had received a letter in April last from her husband in which he had divorced her. She lived alone in her husband’s house in North Nazimabad Block-Q.

Having received the divorce paper she had filed a suit in a court pleading that her husband be called to Pakistan where he should divorce her in a legal manner as a plain paper had no legal value. She had also prayed to the court that she wanted to hand over the property of her husband to him or his legally authorized representative. She had also given an application to the US Consulate in Karachi to verify the divorce paper.

One day when she was at the house of her parents in the same neighbourhood, some people raided the house of Idrees’ daughter and decamped with her car and valuables. They also replaced the locks with new ones. Idrees Ahmed came to know that all this had been done at the behest of a police officer of the rank of DIG who had been placed under suspension and demoted to a lower rank after the dismissal of the Nawaz Sharif government. The officer claimed to be a relative of Nadeem.

When Idrees Ahmed and his daughter visited the house the guards of that officer threatened them of dire consequences if they attempted to visit the house again.

Idrees went to the Sharah-i-Noorjahan police station to lodge a complain. There he was harassed and ordered to hand over the property documents and the papers of the car. The distressed old man returned home. Having no choice but to knock the doors of justice, he filed a petition in court against the police harassment. In the meantime, the police raided his house and summoned him to see the SHO.

Idrees, along with a relative, went to the Shahrah-i-Noor Jahan police station where SHO Jabir Bangash and SI Qasim pressurized him into settling the dispute out of court, saying otherwise he should be prepared to face dire consequences. He was offered Rs350,000 at the police station and was ordered to hand over all the documents of the property and the car. Idrees said to the police officials that the matter was pending in court and asked them to let the court decide. He also said that his daughter’s jewellery worth Rs500,000 was in the house occupied by the police.

This provoked Jabir Bangash and Qasim who abused the old man and roughed him up. As a result, Idrees Ahmed suffered a heart attack in the room of the SHO. The officials did not bother to send him to a hospital. The relative of Idrees Ahmed, who was in the police station, called Idrees’ son who took him first to a private clinic and then to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital. He was then referred to the Institute of Cardio-Vascular Diseases where he remained admitted for five days.

All this was brought to the notice of high-ranking police officials, but no action has so far been taken against the police officials guilty of harassment. The house is still in the possession of the officer who is so influential that he can do what he wants despite having been suspended and demoted in the past.

Is this the service to the people the police keep harping on in their slogan “hum khadim hain hakim naheen” (we are servants, not rulers). Are, then, high-ranking police officers justified in issuing statements that the image of the police has improved in the eyes of the common man? Will they tell the people what action has been taken in this case against those responsible? Can they bring to book the officer behind this misdeed?