LAHORE, Feb 22: A full bench of the Lahore High Court on Thursday granted six weeks to the Punjab government to harmonise all postings and appointments in the police with the Police Order 2002 across the province.

The bench granted the time after the home secretary, while pointing out various practical difficulties being faced in this regard, sought one-month time to substantially comply with the court order. “In view of the volume of work involved, we grant six week’s time to the government to rectify the situation,” the court order said.

The bench had taken up the matter of police postings incongruous with the Police Order 2002, besides law and order situation during proceedings of petitions regarding the killings of additional advocate-general Arif Bhinder and another lawyer, Niaz Sindhu.

The Punjab government had during last hearing informed the court that promotions and transfers of 15 senior police officers had been notified to bring them in conformity with the law at least in Lahore.

Comprising Justice Muzammil Khan, Justice M Bilal Khan and Justice Syed Shabbar Raza Rizvi, the bench had also served contempt of court notice on SSP Chaudhry Shafqaat Ahmad for issuing a statement “amounting to lowering the esteem of the court”.

The SSP on Thursday denied having issued any statement that had been attributed to him in a newspaper. “A respondent cannot even think of disobeying the orders/observations of the honourable court or lower its dignity. Rather he has profound regards and respect for courts,” he said, adding that he had contradicted the statement in the same newspaper very next day.

The SSP also quoted various law points to challenge the stand taken by the Punjab government during previous proceedings that there was no post of SSP (investigation) in the presence of a DIG for the same wing of the police.

As far as the statement of the IGP and the chief secretary regarding the scope of the appointment of SSP (investigation), Lahore under article 18 (2) of the Police Order 2002 is concerned, he said the officials had misinterpreted the law in ignorance of the factual position about the relevant provisions of law. Under article 17 (2) of the law, he said, the provincial police officer or the capital city police officer was authorised to post the SSP in the general police area.

“Under article 18 (2), the head of investigation in a capital city district or city district shall not be below the rank of senior superintendent of police and the article 17 (2) read with article 18 (2) of the Police Order clearly spells out that officer of the rank of SSP could be appointed and posted as such.

“It is further submitted that under article 18 (6) there shall be a board for the change of investigation, headed by an officer not below the rank of SSP besides two SPs”, according to Shafqaat.

Therefore, he argued, the standpoint of the IGP and the chief secretary was not in accordance with the provision of law. Citing a notification of his posting as SSP on Jan 30, 2003, he mentioned the March 4, 2006 order of Lahore police chief wherein the board was constituted and the answering respondent was heading the board meetings as SSP (investigation) till the date of his latest transfer order on Feb 12, 2007.

The bench asked the IGP to go through the legal point and submit his comments on the next date of hearing on March 2.

As for the progress on the two murders, the court said: “Although we are satisfied with the conduct of investigation, we expect the process to be accelerated and final report under section 173 CrPC to be submitted without unnecessary loss of time.”

The full bench observed that the Muhafiz Force was disturbing motorcyclists and pedestrians to fleece money which had worsened the law and order situation.

It said the Elite force should be assigned the duty of protecting the life and property of the common man instead of VIPs.