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| April 21, 2007 | Saturday | Rabi-us-Sani 03, 1428 |
Police misuse powers under HR officers’ nose
ISLAMABAD, April 20: Police continue to misuse their power despite the induction of Human Rights Officers (HROs) in the city’s police stations.
Dawn has learnt that at least four cases of human rights violations have taken place in Islamabad’s 12 police stations since January 2006 though the HROs do not acknowledge that.
They, however, admitted that police continued to indulge in misuse of power in their absence.
Some persons in the custody of police complained that they were tortured and the HROs themselves witnessed some being detained illegally in the police stations.
Officers found involved in illegal practices were issued verbal warnings by the HROs. Many cases of misuse of power were settled in the police stations by the HROs.
Sources said that several investigating officers were found guilty of violating rules but HROs intervention settled the matter within the premises of the police station, preventing it from reaching senior police officers.
Additional Superintendent of Police Islamabad Dr Moin Masood told Dawn that two cases of human rights violation — one relating to custodial killing — were reported in 2006 but none this year so far.
Since the deployment of HROs, four cases of human rights violations in the Shahzad Town and Golra Police stations have been registered with the high-ups of police. Shahzad Town SHO Idrees Rathor and HRO Ulfat Arif and Golra SHO Sattar Shah and HRO Qasir were suspended consequently.
An IO of Tarnol police station was suspended for keeping a woman in police custody during night and an IO of Abpara police station was suspended for torturing a person in police custody.
Senior officers of the police talking to Dawn on condition of anonymity said they have to use torture and detain accused and suspects “to produce result, though it was illegal practice”. Coercion made them to confess their crime or tell the truth.
If the police go by the rules they will have to register a case and produce the accused or the suspect in the court of law. Once they are granted bail or sent on judicial remand, it becomes very difficult for the police to investigate a case, they argued.
The HROs have no power to stop police officers from violating human rights and have to approach their superiors for action against the guilty. Their job demands that they protect human rights and not to interfere other activities of police.
Most of the human rights violations occur during night and HROs are not present in the police stations at that time. Every morning the HROs investigate the detained persons about the police behaviour and what happened to them during their detention.
According to police sources, a victim of police torture would not open his/her mouth in front of anyone for he/she was seared and worry about their future.
The HROs are bound to record name and address of every person picked up by the police and to inform immediately his/her family members that the person was in police custody.
However, the tactics employed by the investigation officers (IO) prevent the HROs from doing that. The IO provides the data of the accused to HROs three to four hours after their detention, with the excuses that they are bound to complete legal paper work first.
Other duties of the HROs want them to stop torture in police custody, provide basic needs of life to detainees, to check that no one is kept in police custody without a challan and to present the detainee in the court of law within 24 hours.
Also the HROs have to see that police did not keep juvenile and women in male police stations. Similarly accused women can be kept only in a women police station and if any woman was picked up by the police or called for investigation than she should have a male companion.
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