RAWALPINDI: An inquiry has been launched into the poorly cooked and extremely low quality food served to hundreds of police personnel deployed on Muharram security duty. Some officers were not even offered meal.

SP Crime Sikandar Hayat was appointed inquiry officer who will fix the responsibility for the dereliction of duty.

The SP said the inquiry would first ascertain how many police officers were not served food and water and would then proceed to look at the quality of the food served.

Some 1,040 police personnel, which are 52 reserves of police, including trainee assistant SIs and SIs were called to Rawalpindi from the Police College Sihala to assist the local police at Ashura.

When they reached Rawalpindi, some officers were not offered any food and were taken straight to Sadiqabad on duty. Many then had to go to nearby restaurants when they found there were no arrangements for lunch.

When they returned to Sihala that night, the officers were directed to report to the DSP headquarters for a briefing on security plans for the main mourning procession of Muharram 10th.

Regional Police Officer (RPO) Mohammad Wisal Fakhar Sultan Raja confirmed that the officers had to go hungry and said the issue was resolved when he came to know about it.

He said all the reserve police officers were served a good meal both at noon and at night. However, he blamed the Police College Sihala’s administration and said they should have fed their officers before sending them off to Rawalpindi.

According to police sources, when the RPO came to know that some officers had to go hungry, chicken curry and rice was ordered from the market and served to the officers in Rawalpindi Police Lines. The officers were also filmed and photographed while eating.

However, when the issue was talked about in the media, the Inspector General of Police Punjab ordered an inquiry into the poor quality of the food served because the government had set aside funds for police officers’ meals.

Published in Dawn, November 10th, 2015