LAHORE, Aug 30: The Federal Selection Board has reportedly cleared 26 DIGs in the country for the promotion to the rank of additional IGs in BS-21 as against the 30 posts sanctioned by the prime minister, Dawn learnt here on Wednesday.

Similarly, less than half of the SSPs have been cleared for promotion to the rank of DIGs in BS-20, official sources said.

They said the officers had been selected according to the best of the best policy to determine the future shape of police administration in the country. The criteria of service, record, completion of ACRs, general reputation, intelligence reports and courses in the National Defence College or Staff College and NIPA were strictly followed, they said, but agreed that there could also be some other considerations in a few instances.

The prime minister would formally notify the promotions after an approval within a fortnight. And, sources said, normally the prime minister ratified the decision by the selection board.

The board which cleared the promotions of the police officers was headed by the Federal Public Service Commission chairman and comprised all the provincial chief secretaries and IGPs of Punjab, Sindh and the NWFP.

They said many officers went through the promotion process smoothly because of their strong service record and field reports whereas the IGPs had to back some others for promotions.

According to them, the names of 100 officers were placed for promotion to BS-21 from all over the country. They belonged to second, third and fourth commons. However, only 26 could be cleared for promotion, keeping four seats vacant.

They said it was expected that the board would consider cases of officers up to DIG Javed Noor. But owing to the failure of some senior officers to get through, DIG Aftab Sultan was also considered. Both the officers were cleared for promotion.

Others included Asrar Ahmad, Khwaja Khalid Farooq, Talat Mahmood, Abdul Majeed, Tariq Saleem Dogar, Tariq Khosa and Wasim Kausar. The name of a DIG considered to be closer to the Punjab chief minister was reportedly dropped along with another DIG posted in Punjab.

The names of SSPs up to 13th common were considered for nearly 47 seats of DIGs but not many were cleared because of various reasons mainly incomplete ACRs, field experience and intelligence reports.

Those who were cleared included Sheikhupura SSP Aslam Tarin, former Lahore SSP Zulfikar Cheema, FIA deputy director Mushtaq Sukhera, former Lahore SSP Zubair Mahmood, Rawalpindi Anti-Corruption Establishment Additional Director Muhammad Zubair, Sukkur SSP Ghulam Shabbir Sheikh, FIA deputy director Khalid Qureshi, Gujranwala SSP Mian Asif, Rawalpindi SSP Saud Aziz, Punjab AIG Operations Rai Altaf Husain, CID SSPs Khuda Bakhsh Awan and Abid Qadri.

Sources said it was the biggest ever selection of the senior police officers and this would open floodgates of promotions for those in lower grades.

This would follow promotion of SPs to the ranks of SSPs and ASPs to SPs. The vacant posts of ASPs would be filled through fresh recruitments. Similarly, DSPs would also be promoted to the rank of SPs in case of unavailability of ASPs for the purpose.

Officials said the police officers of various commons had been considered for promotion at the same time because of delay in their promotion. Many DMG officers of the second common were promoted to BS-21 many years ago and some of them were now in BS-22 serving as chief secretaries or federal secretaries. —Intikhab Hanif