June 17, 2006	Saturday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 20, 1427

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PESHAWAR, June 16: The Coordination Council of all District Public Safety and Police Complaint Commissions of the NWFP will move the Peshawar High Court against non-payment of emoluments to members of the commissions by the provincial government. The council, which comprises chairmen of all the commissions of the province, took this decision in a meeting held here on Friday. Briefing the media after the meeting, the council’s chairperson Attaullah Jan said that under section 37(2) of the Police Order-2000, each commission should have independent budget under separate allocation in the provincial budget.

He said the council would send a copy of the decision to the provincial government and if it failed to provide TA/DA and honorarium to members of District Public Safety and Police Complaint Commissions within 15 days, the council would file a writ petition in the high court.

The meeting discussed in detail various issues pertaining to non cooperation by the provincial government and police department, legal position of selection panels and benefits/emoluments for members of the commissions.

Mr Jan stated that on May 15, the Sukkur bench of the Sindh High Court had disposed of a writ petition after an assurance by the Sindh Government that Rs3000 per month would be given as honorarium to the members of the District Public Safety and Police Complaint Commissions. The Punjab government had already been paying the such emoluments, he added.

“The provincial government is not interested in strengthening the safety commissions, therefore no step has been taken to create a separate budgetary head of account,” Mr Jan said, adding that the commissions had been rendering valuable services and despite various hurdles, they had so far disposed of about 4600 complaints across the province. He added that the high ups of the police had been trying to curb the commissions’ powers, adding that these bodies had kept an eye on police abuses.