A cleanliness campaign ordered by the Punjab government got underway in the urban centres of the province this week. It is aimed at preventing outbreak of deadly dengue fever by destroying mosquito-breeding grounds in cities.

In Rawalpindi, the police have taken to the campaign enthusiastically for good, grim reasons – parts of the police headquarters complex in the city reek of cesspools. Police teams had already been out in bazaars checking and sealing scrap shops and food outlets found dirty. Orders from Lahore to ‘clean up’ have only expanded the activity.

City Police Officer Israr Ahmed Abbasi apparently decided to start by cleaning up home grounds first. With assistance from the Rawalpindi Waste Management Company (RWMC) the task began on Wednesday in the police lines headquarters where hundreds of police personnel of reserve force, senior police officers and their families live.

But the low ranking police officials housed in barracks don’t have the basic facility of toilets at all. A common facility, having 20 washrooms, was built some years ago but is located some 400 metres away from the living quarters.

“So, policemen rather ease themselves in nooks and corners and behind high walls,” said a resident policeman identifying himself as Adnan.

“Who would trek to the far off facility if he needs to urinate in the dead of night? One would shiver going there even during daytime for the place reeks terribly.”

And the ‘shy ones’ go to the roof of their dormitory to escape prying eyes, according to others.

Signs in Urdu ‘Yahan paishab karna mana hai’ (urinating not allowed here) stare from the walls of barracks and other buildings in the vast police lines but grounds underneath them are stained and smelly.

Sufferers say the “toilet crisis” worsens when extra police personnel and Punjab Constabulary are called in from outside in emergency situations and are quartered in the police lines. Queues outside the few toilet facilities grow longer and the air become more pungent than usual.

“Sometimes there is such pressure that people are found urinating under the staircases and balconies, aggravating the pervading stink,” said a regular resident of the police lines, wishing senior police officers “come and see the miserable conditions their subordinates live in”.

“Dengue danger is always present here,” he added, pointing to two large size uncovered water-tanks that serve a part of the police lines. 

Though CPO’s own office boasts of toilet facilities, it looks not much different in terms of general cleanliness. Two septic tanks have been lying uncovered in the office grounds for long.

However, the police had been very active in the anti-dengue campaign elsewhere, raiding tyre shops, restaurants, indeed wherever they see dirty water in open space.

Shop owners and others keeping water in open containers are promptly arrested.

“Will the police similarly take action against the police officers who are responsible for keeping the police lines and other police establishments clean and provide basic facility of toilets to their force but don’t,” wondered policeman Waheed Ahmed.

In 2011, a similar anti-dengue campaign, undertaken by the then CPO Azhar Hameed Khokhar on the directive of Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, had proved just “an eyewash”.

Published in Dawn, May 30th, 2015

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