NAROWAL: Sialkot police arrested 40 beggars, including 11 women, in a crackdown.

District Police Officer Faisal Shahzad told Dawn that the police had first monitored the human intelligence source and the safe city cameras to break the network of beggars. He said a large number of professional beggars were seen in the streets, markets and shopping centres of the city. He said the beggars, including women, were also seen in government and private hospitals.

The DPO said police teams arrested 40 beggars during the crackdown in the last 24 hours and 36 FIRs had been registered against them with various police stations. He said the arrested beggars belonged to different districts of Pakistan.

The police officer said that without the cooperation of the citizens, it would not be possible to break the network of beggars and the citizens should not financially promote the beggars and give financial help to only those needy people they personally knew. He declared that the crackdown against beggars would continue.

Published in Dawn, March 25th, 2025