LAHORE: The Capital City Police has decided to revive the Narcotics Investigation Units (NIUs) at the sub-division level to eradicate the menace of drug abuse and to improve conviction rate in drug pushing cases.

Under the plan, two to three investigation officers will be posted at each NIU after training for better handling of cases.

Police have sent to the chief drug inspector a list of 75 drug stores in the city selling narcotics to addicts for taking a joint action like registration of cases, imposition of major penalties, including sealing of such medical stores and cancellation of their licenses.

They have also updated a list of 300 suspected drug dealers active in the city and a major operation would be initiated against them in collaboration with the ANF.

Lahore Capital City Police Officer Additional IG Ghulam Mahmood Dogar shared a draft of the proposal in a meeting at the district police lines, Lahore.

Punjab Prosecutor General Rai Mushtaq Ahmad, Chief Drug Inspector Punjab Azhar Jamal Saleemi, ANF Deputy Director Operations Major Waqar Ahmad and representative of excise department also attended the meeting besides DIG Operations Sohail Chaudhry and other senior police officers.

Addressing the meeting, the CCPO said all the cases/investigation of drug crimes would be transferred to the proposed NIU for an efficient and transparent process.

“The reforms introduced in investigation and prosecution process through NIU would ensure maximum punishment to the drug dealers,” he said.

This process, according to him, would bring more transparency as the personnel of the operations wing in collaboration with ANF, special branch, excise department and drug inspectors would conduct intelligence-based raids, arrest criminals and lodge cases.

The NIU detectives would then conduct investigation, collect evidence and pursue the cases in courts.In the proposed scheme, the departmental punishment has also been elaborated to fix sub-divisional police officers (SDPOs) if any accused of narcotics case gets acquittal from courts or escapes conviction due to weak challan.

The prosecution department and NIUs would go hand in hand to remove any possible lacunas or flaws in such cases to insure convictions.

A three-day training course will soon be conducted under the supervision of DSP Rehan Jamal at the police lines where experts from prosecution department will impart necessary training regarding investigation process to the IOs inducted for the NIUs.

The CCPO has designated SSP Operations as the focal person to conduct raids for the arrest of drug traffickers whereas SSP Investigation will be the focal person for investigation in narcotics cases.

“In the prevailing system, the Lahore police is the sole complainant, witness and investigator in the cases against drug peddlers. That’s why the conviction rate remained only 48 per cent,” Ghulam Mahmood Dogar said.

“There is a dire need to focus on supply route as well as demand side of drugs and to bring into mainstream the addicts and students of colleges and universities. There are around 6,000 addicts in the city and they are the main customers of narcotics, particularly injectable drugs,” Mr Dogar said.

Published in Dawn, October 17th, 2021