PESHAWAR: If you have any complaint against police in any district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regarding registration of a genuine case, you do not need to write application and go through security barriers for submitting it to the police.

“You just need to send a short text message to the central police office and will get a response within 24 hours,” Sajjad Khan, chief of the police complaint cell, told Dawn during a visit to the cell here on Monday.

He said the initiative had been taken by inspector general of police Nasir Khan Durrani, who would monitor the facility to benefit the complainants, who had no access to the police and faced hardships in lodging their reports.

Read: Online FIR registration procedure announced

According to him, the complaint cell, which is to be formally inaugurated soon, has been established in the central police office, where anyone could send complaints through SMS to be automatically transferred to the computer for print for further action.

Sajjad said the complaint would be forwarded to the relevant district police officer with special directives of the IGP to respond to it within 24 hours otherwise the red light in the complaint cell would continue blinking until the cell didn’t get the response.

He said in the genuine cases, FIRs would be registered without hesitation by the officials concerned to ensure dispensation of speedy justice to the people.

The complaint cell’s chief said police had developed the system to receive public complaints through SMS and to make early coordinated efforts for solution of the issues within the shortest possible time.

He said the service would facilitate the general public to lodge complaints against the police officials and that complaint would be addressed in 24 hours.

Sajjad said a special number i.e. 0315-9007777 had been allocated for the SMS service, which would become functional very soon.

He said besides short message service, the complaints would also be received through different means like fax, telephone, manually, through email and post offices.

The complaint cell’s chief said awareness of the facility would be created to address the people’s problems.

Meanwhile, spokesman for the police Riaz Ahmad said all additional IGPs, DIGs, DPOs and SDPOs in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had been given special official cellphone numbers to bring more improvement in close contact with the general public, ensure coordinated efforts against crimes and in-time action to address public complaints.

He said these official mobile numbers in serial had been allocated for the above designated posts.

“In case of transfer of any police officer deployed to designated posts, the mobile number will be automatically transferred to the newly incumbent officer. The special numbers will remain open round the clock to remove the communication gap between the police and the public,” he said.

The spokesman said the step had been taken to effectively bridge the gap between the public and the police to address their complaints and launch coordinated efforts to preempt and prevent crimes.

The official expressed the hope that the step would go a long way in ensuring peace and security in the society.

He said the numbers would be used exclusively for official purpose.

The official said the provincial police had taken a number of steps for better coordination between the public and the police to resolve public complaints and establish a crime-free society.

He said the complaint management cell was in addition to the facility of online FIRs and police assistance line to address public grievances.

Published in Dawn, November 4th, 2014