RAWALPINDI: Inspector General of Police (IGP) Punjab Inam Ghani has asked the city and district police chiefs across the province to prepare a complete list of ‘accused’ involved in all registered cases who are still at large so that they could be declared as ‘proclaimed offenders’ by the end of this month.

The Punjab police chief has decided to declare all such accused as proclaimed offenders by Feb 28, 2021, a spokesman said.

In a directive to all the district police officers, including the city police officer Rawalpindi, the IGP asked them to maintain a complete list of ‘accused at large’ so that the process of declaring them proclaimed offenders could be completed.

The district police chiefs have been asked to prepare the lists and update the data in the Police Station Record Management System (PSRMS).

A deadline has also been given to complete the process after which a large-scale crackdown will be carried out across Punjab to arrest the accused.

Similarly, the district police officers have been asked to immediately complete the records of the accused who are at large.

The directive said there should be no discrepancy between the lists and data of the accused prepared manually in each district and that of PSRMS.

The district police chiefs were also directed to complete the process on top priority.

The records of the accused are being shared all over Punjab through computerised methods and the police station record management system is connected to the Central Police Office (CPO) in Lahore.

“Ensure regular monitoring in Rawalpindi. All cases, including serious cases, in which legal requirements have been met and minor work is pending have been finalised and the preparation of lists of accused has been started,” said the spokesman.

After preparation of the lists, a large-scale crackdown will be launched across Punjab to arrest the accused.

The spokesman said that in Rawalpindi district the police had arrested 389 accused involved in heinous cases (category A) registered under the Anti-Terrorism Act and 2,423 accused (category B) involved in other cases during 2020.

Likewise, 66 accused categorised as ‘A’ and 230 accused categorised as ‘B’ have been arrested so far in 2021. There are 535 accused falling in category ‘A’ and 3,366 in category ‘B’ in the district, he added.

Published in Dawn, February 19th, 2021