ISLAMABAD: Tahir Alam Khan became the first officer to retire as the inspector general of the capital police since the post was created in 1981.

Senior officers in the city police told Dawn that all the IGPs in the past were either transferred or removed from the post due to different reasons.

Khan was the 29th IGP of the capital who worked on the post since September 1, 2014. Since 2003, most of the IGPs were removed for their failure to control law and order or to accommodate political appointees, they added.

On Wednesday, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan told a meeting that DIG Headquarters Khalid Khattak would be working as the acting police chief till the appointment of a permanent IGP Islamabad.

The police officers said DIG Khattak was suspended after a departmental inquiry into the murder of outlawed Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan leader Azam Tariq near Tarnol in October 2003 gave adverse remarks about him. At that time, Khattak was working as the SSP Islamabad.

Since then, he has not been assigned any operational position and confined to the administrative side of the police. However, on a number of occasions, he served as the acting IGP.

According to interior ministry sources, three officers are being considered for the post of the IGP and a summery has been moved to the Prime Minister Office for a final decision. The officers are: Regional Police Officer (RPO) Rawalpindi Fakhar Sultan Raja, former IGP Islamabad Kaleem Imam and Director Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) Inam Ghani.

RPO Raja is a brother of SNGPL chairman Syed Mehdi’s son-in-law, sources said. They said Mr Mehdi was a former aide to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and still close to him.

Mr Ghani is in the good books of the interior minister who frequently appreciates his services in the FIA. Mr Imam served as the IGP Islamabad during the PPP tenure and SSP Islamabad when Zafarullah Khan Jamali was the prime minister.

Published in Dawn, January 8th, 2016