Police told to take strict action against drug peddling in educational institutions

Published January 17, 2019
The chief minister was presiding over a weekly meeting on law and order at the CM House on Wednesday. — File photo
The chief minister was presiding over a weekly meeting on law and order at the CM House on Wednesday. — File photo

KARACHI: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah has urged the Sindh police to keep strict vigilance on peddling of narcotics in educational institutions.

“This is a serious matter and must be handled seriously,” he said and added that whenever he met parents they urged him to take strict action against peddling of narcotics in educational institutions.

“I am quite concerned about our children, who are the future of Pakistan and we have to bring them up in a safe, secure and healthy atmosphere,” he said.

He also directed the education secretary to develop coordination between private educational institution administrations and the police and also involve parents in the matter, if necessary, to develop a mechanism to stop narcotics peddling in educational institutions.

‘Most private security guards are untrained, which is dangerous’

The chief minister, presiding over a weekly meeting on law and order here at the CM House on Wednesday, also directed the home secretary to issue instructions to all security companies to get verification of their guards.

“I want security audit of all the guards employed by security agencies,” he said and added that apart from verification of their personnel, their weapons must be inspected.

“I have noticed that most of the private security guards are untrained which is dangerous,” he said and highlighted the need for making police training centres more professional for the training of new recruits and in-service training.

He also referred to two upcoming important events — PSL and multinational ‘Naval AMAN’ exercise — where the police had to provide security, therefore necessary meetings with the quarters concerned must be organised.

Operation against drug mafia

Earlier, DIG South Sharjeel Kharal told the chief minister that he had arrested a key suspect involved in developing a group to smuggle narcotics into educational institutions. IGP Kaleem Imam said that on the instructions of the chief minister the police had already launched a targeted operation against the drug mafia and had busted different gangs.

Explaining progress on implementation of the decisions taken in last week’s meeting on law and order, the DIG said he had held meetings with the DHA authorities for the installation of more CCTV cameras and fixing the faulty ones. Street lights in the DHA and Clifton areas were being improved and upgraded, he added.

The IGP told the chief minister that the culprits of the Chinese consulate attack had been arrested. Additional IG of the CTD Dr Waliullah Dal and CTD DIG Abdullah Shaikh briefed the chief minister on busting a gang involved in making fake arms licences even of banned bores.

IGP Imam said that on the lead given by the arrested suspects (involved in making fake licences) their facilitators in the police department and DC offices had also been taken into custody.

Steps to curb street crime

DIG East Amir Farooqui and DIG West Amin Yousafzai briefed the chief minister on the steps taken by them to curb street crime.

The IG police said that he had created a special force of 10 to 20 well-trained policemen being stationed at the SSP offices so that they could be called in case of any eventuality. The first batch of the force had been posted in the South zone in the first phase and in the second phase this deployment would be made in other zones. This initiative has been made after the attack on the Chinese consulate when police force was called from different police stations.

The IGP told the chief minister that he was preparing a mechanism to start police recruitment round the year as “over 10,000 policemen retire from service every year, therefore recruitment process as approved by the chief minister was being started”.

The meeting was attended by Adviser on Law Murtaza Wahab, IGP Kaleem Imam, home secretary Kazi Kabir, AIG CTD Dr Waliullah Dal and Commissioner of Karachi Iftikhar Shallwani.

Business portal

Four provincial government departments signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) to launch Sindh Business Registration Portal to help entrepreneurs complete all their registration procedure online.

The MoU was signed between the investment department of government of Sindh and SECP, labour department, industries and commerce department and Sessi.

Published in Dawn, January 17th, 2019

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