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SUKKUR: Thirteen policemen belonging to the Punjab police were sent to jail on a 14-day remand on Monday after they were arrested for carrying out an “unauthorised” raid in Sukkur to pick up three suspected kidnappers a day earlier.
According to the Sukkur police, a raiding team led by DSP Aijaz Larik and Kot Sabzal (Rahim Yar Khan district) SHO Nasir Mahar carried out an unauthorised raid at a place on Airport Road in Sukkur late on Sunday evening and picked up three suspects.
Upon receiving information about the raid, Sukkur SSP Amjad Shaikh sent a police contingent to the area which, after hot pursuit, intercepted the convoy of the Punjab police in the Ghauspur area of Kandhkot-Kashmore district.
Thirteen members of the raiding team were apprehended and one of the three suspects, Fareed Khoso, was freed from their custody.
However, the vehicles carrying the DSP, SHO and other members of the raiding team managed to cross into Punjab along with the two other suspects, Sharif Khoso and Nasrullah Khoso.
SSP Shaikh said that the action against the raiding team was taken as the mandatory permission for the raid and arrest on Sindh’s soil was not obtained from the competent authority. Nor were the Sindh police informed of the raid in advance, he added.
The arrested policemen, an ASI and 12 constables, were booked under FIR No 7/2017 registered at the Airport police station on the complaint of Fareed Khoso. They were produced before the First Civil Judge of Sukkur, Fauzia Bhambhro, on Monday for remand in police custody but the judge gave them in judicial custody for 14 days.
The handcuffed policemen were accordingly sent to Sukkur jail.
When contacted for comment, DSP Larik and SHO Mahar criticised the Sindh police over their action, claiming that permission for the raid had been obtained from the Sindh home secretary.
They said that the three suspects picked up by the raiding team were wanted by the Punjab police in a 2011 kidnapping-for-ransom case.
They demanded release of their 13 fellow policemen and quashment of the FIR registered against them.
Published in Dawn, March 7th, 2017
