HYDERABAD, April 6: The District Public Safety Commission on Tuesday sought action against four police officials. It is learnt that chairperson of the District Public Safety Commission Masood Pervez has sent a letter to the DPO (operations) Hyderabad and SP (investigations) calling for action against DSP (rural) investigation, SHO of the Hatri police station Yar Mohammad Nizamani, in-charge investigation team of the Hatri police station Mehboob Shah and ASI Allan Khan Abbasi.

The chairperson has addressed an official letter to the DPO (operations) Hyderabad and SP investigations Hyderabad, informing them that these officials had repeatedly transgressed their official authority despite the fact that the commission had recommended departmental action against them five months ago.

They, the DPSC chief alleged had been committing excesses against the public at large. A copy of the letter has also been sent to the chairman of the National Reconstruction Bureau, adviser to the Sindh chief minister on home affairs, the secretary home department, Provincial Police Officer (PPO) Sindh, Regional Police Officer and DIGP operations Hyderabad.

The DSPC chairperson deplored the apathy of senior police officers in this regard, saying the commission had no information pertaining to the investigation of the case in question for which the departmental action had been recommended, adding that it did not know whether any action had been taken or not.

He said that if action against police officials was not taken, the commission would fail in addressing public complaints against police. The chairperson had received a complaint from a man named Chaudhry Zulfikar, who claimed that following a scuffle over a watercourse, his FIR was registered after a delay of 20 days while his case had been disposed of as a cancel class case, proving his charges to be false.

A case in this regard was lodged at the Hatri police station under relevant sections in 2002. The commission had conducted a fact-finding inquiry in this regard and these policemen were found guilty of gross misconduct and dereliction of duty.

The DPSC chairperson had reported the matter through a letter to SP investigations, recommending the case to be reinvestigated by a police officer not below the rank of a DSP besides calling for suspension/departmental action against these policemen under Clause 155 of THE Police Order 2002.

The chairperson said that the SP investigation had informed him that the investigation had been entrusted to the DSP (urban) and the DPO operations had been asked to take action against the SHO in October 2003.

The chairperson said that he had assumed that action had been taken against these policemen. However, this was not the case. He said that since then, there has been no information if any action had been taken against them during the past five months.