LAHORE, April 18: DIG Pervaiz Rathore is most likely to be the new capital city police officer of Lahore while the names of SSP Amir Zulfikar Khan and SSP Shafiq Ahmad Gujjar are under consideration for new operations police chief, Dawn has learnt.

Sources in the central police office said Pervaiz Rathore, who is currently DIG National Highway & Motorway

Police, would replace incumbent CCPO (additional IG) Malik Muhammad Iqbal and a notification was expected any time.

Mr Rathore is considered a professional police officer and is very close to the PML-N high command. He has served as SSP Islamabad for five years.

Amir Zulfikar Khan, who is currently SSP special branch Lahore region, has already served as SSP operations in Lahore between June 2005 and January 2007.

He enjoys the reputation of being a professional and hard working police officer.

He also served for three years as the Toba Tek Singh DPO. He was credited with managing peaceful first international marathon and constituting ‘Mohafiz Force’ to maintain law and order. He had been transferred prematurely by the previous provincial government after he reportedly refused to entertain illegal requests.

Mr Gujjar, who is Intelligence Bureau (Punjab) director, had also served as SP Mandi Bahauddin in Shahbaz Sharif’s previous government.

Sources said Punjab IGP Shaukat Javed remained in contact with DIG Pervaiz Rathore and SSP Amir Zulfikar Khan on Friday.