KARACHI: The Sindh government has made a hefty allocation of Rs179.7 billion for law and order including security, law enforcement and prisons in Sindh for the financial year 2025-26.

In the outgoing fiscal year, the government had allocated Rs172bn and the current budget shows an increase of 4.5 per cent.

According to the budget document, the proposed Rs179.7bn budget for law and order has substantial portion — Rs117bn — for police, underscoring the government’s prioritisation of security in the provincial capital, which continues to face challenges ranging from street crime to high-profile incidents.

Besides, the government has proposed an allocation of Rs9.92bn for prisons in the fiscal year 2025-26, marking a 20 per cent increase from the Rs8.21bn allocated in the outgoing fiscal year.

This proposed rise in the prisons budget came days after the Malir jailbreak earlier this month when more than 200 inmates escaped.

In his budget speech, Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah stated: “We have proposed the budget estimates of Rs179.7bn for next financial year for the security and law enforcement activities in Sindh.”

“In conclusion, it is to reaffirm the unwavering commitment to maintain law and order across the province. In pursuance of such commitment, Sindh police are being equipped with the resources, training, and reforms they need to meet today’s challenges.”

Rs200m for provincial intelligence centre

The CM also stated that this year his government had established the Provincial Intelligence Fusion & Threat Assessment Centre (PIFTAC), which is a platform to collect intelligence reports from all relevant intelligence and law enforcement agencies.

In this regard, funds Rs200 million has been provided to start with, he said, adding that a sum of 400m has been provided for procurement of bulletproof vehicles for extending security to the foreign nationals, especially Chinese engineers, delegates and nationals.

Among other plans, the chief minister referred to a new proposed unit under “Organisational Upgradation” calling it “top priority” of the government of Sindh.

“In order to inculcate a sense of security in people commuting on highways, a new unit namely Sindh Police Highway Patrol is established as a pilot project by deployment of 1,200 personnel patrolling in 71 vehicles on 40 beats covering major highways. The detailed proposal is being worked out to formally start coverage of 2,153-kilometres of highways with 92 vehicles (including 13 APCs) by 1,900 personnel,” he added.

The CM also spoke about “successful” execution of different initiatives during 2024-25.

He rejected the impression of a growing trend of street crime in Karachi and referred to a data which suggested a sharp decline in the number of criminal activities in the metropolis.

“Overall law and order situation in Sindh remained peaceful during the past year and efforts are underway to ensure effective control on crime,” said Mr Shah.

“Effective strategy and efficient deployment against street crimes in Karachi have resulted in considerable control.” He said vehicular snatching and theft this year had reduced by 67 per cent and violent street robberies declined by 54 per cent when compared with previous year.

“Sindh police is focused on detection by using advanced investigation techniques consequently detection rate is improved, which remained at 81 per cent.”

He said implementation of “comprehensive set of counter-terrorism measures” by Sindh police in 2024-25 were aimed at ensuring public safety and neutralising threats posed by extremist elements.

“These efforts are combined with intelligence-led operations, advanced training, and inter-agency coordination to combat terrorism effectively across the province,” he said.

“As a result, no significant act of terrorism has been carried out in Sindh except a suicide attack on the convoy of Chinese nationals near the Jinnah International Airport in October 2024. The high profile incident was efficiently worked out by the CTD Sindh in a very brief time.”

In its counter-terrorism drive, he said that Sindh police had arrested 210 terrorists belonging to various banned outfits in year 2024 and 42 during current year while four terrorists were neutralised during “encounters” with the law-enforcement agency.

Published in Dawn, June 14th, 2025