MULTAN, Feb 8: Federal and provincial civil servants have expressed shock over the institution of a sedition case against Rajanpur’s political assistant.

Acting on a written complaint of District Coordination Officer Samiullah Abid, Rajanpur police have arrested PA Chaudhry Mohammad Aslam on charges of a criminal breach of trust (409-PPC) and sedition and involvement in anti-state activities (124(A)-PPC).

Mr Aslam’s visit to Dera Bugti last Sunday in a highly-charged atmosphere in the backdrop of attacks on Sui Gas pipelines near Mazari Goth is said to be the reason for registration of a sedition case against him.

Talking to local journalists at Rajanpur City Police Station, he denied the allegations levelled against him and claimed that his visit to Dera Bugti was to urge Nawab Akbar Bugti to reconcile with the Mazaris and bring peace to the area.

Initial reports also suggested that the PA had informed some Rajanpur officials hailing from Dera Bugti that he was trying to meet Nawab Bugti, and the Mazari elders should be prepared for a possible Jirga of the warring tribes.

Chaudhry Aslam was posted as PA in Rajanpur on Nov 11, 2002. The office of PA has been maintaining law and order in tribal areas since the colonial period. The colonial masters had invested enormous powers in the office to harness the wild tribes. However, with the passage of time the powers of PA office have been cut to the size and the office no more has awesome authority to impress the headstrong tribal chiefs.

Colleagues of Chaudhry Aslam said the Sui Gas crisis was triggered by Mazari-Bugti clashes in the area, before the PA was able to comprehend the nature of his job, which existed only in the districts of Rajanpur and Dera Ghazi Khan in the Punjab. Although the areas where gas pipelines were attacked fell in the jurisdiction of police, the local authorities initially covered up their inefficiency by telling the highups that the spot was part of tribal areas. That was when the misfortunes of Chaudhry Aslam started.

The then DCO Mohammad Arshad was made an OSD as part of the fallout of first attack on the pipelines on Jan 21, even though the law and order is not the subject of the DCO office under the devolution plan. The new DCO, Samiullah Abid, allegedly did not have any trouble-shooting guts and the only thing he did was to tighten the noose around the PA.

The situation further aggravated with the advent of the Rangers, who had come to guard the ‘under attack’ gas pipelines. A number of senior officials told this correspondent that the attitude of military officials towards civilian officers had always been humiliating and contemptuous whenever they were assigned a civil duty.

They said Chaudhry Aslam’s one-man mission to Dera Bugti was due to pressure and frustration arising out of hostile working conditions and an uncooperative top hierarchy.

Among the list of ambiguities that have emerged in the official working since the introduction of devolution plan, one is the functioning of PA office. Before the devolution plan, PA’s immediate boss was the deputy commissioner, who also worked as the senior commandant of border military police. Since the abolition of all-powerful DC office, there has been a great anomaly as to who holds the office of senior commandant.

According to official sources, the provincial home secretary is presumably working as the senior commandant while the PA holds the office of EMP commandant. Sources said the PCS officers usually found it difficult to talk to the provincial secretariat where the bosses either belonged to the district management group or the army.

Sources in Rajanpur administration said Chaudhry Aslam had been encouraged by some of his colleagues to go on a peace mission and told tales of the powers that the PAs once used to exert to tame the tribal chiefs. Inspired by a ‘new found’ feeling of authority, Chaudhry Aslam wore the commandant’s uniform and went straight to the Rangers to tell them that he also mattered.

However, his confidence shattered when Nawab Bugti reportedly refused to see him. Whatever self-esteem he might have been left with, was reportedly lost in a telegraphic “chat”, in Dera Bugti, with a top bureaucrat of Balochistan who was also a retired military officer.

The PA spoke about his ordeal with a number of newsmen.

A senior official said the act of Chaudhry Aslam did not warrant registration of a sedition case against him. “The action against Chaudhry Aslam could not have had civilian origins,” he apprehended, saying: “A departmental inquiry for disciplinary action was enough for a civil servant.”

He pointed out that maintenance of law and order under the devolution plan was a responsibility of the district Nazim, against whom no action had so far been taken.

He said Rajanpur was a classic example of the anarchy and collapse of the state apparatus due to a lack of forum to settle tribal disputes. Highwaymen even kidnapped police officials for ransom, he said, adding that helplessness of Rajanpur police was laid bare when the Rahim Yar Khan police had to take action against outlaws in the riverine belt of Rajanpur.