| Commissioner system should be reactivated |
| Friday, 13 June 2008 | |
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The Government of Pakistan is now considering the reintroduction of the old Commissionerate system due to which the old divisions and districts will be revived, said reliable sources. These were abolished with the introduction of the Police Order 2002 and the Local government Ordinance (LGO) enacted by the Federal Government. In fact, during the first Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) government when the late Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali (Z.A.) Bhutto came to power, the office of Commissioner and Deputy Inspector General (DIG) were abolished. However, six months later, Z.A. Bhutto revived the post of the Commissioner and DIG throughout Sindh again. The original Commissionerate system which was introduced in the subcontinent by the British government worked without any problems, even in the early days of the newly independent Pakistan and India. After independence, the Indian government introduced revolutionary changes in the system and continued the Panchayat system, which has been running smoothly without any problems. However, in Pakistan, the system under which the different Deputy Commissioners were heading the districts was always targeted by politicians. This was because the Deputy Commissioner as the district head had the power to control all departments, including the police, in the capacity of a district magistrate. Moreover, at the grass-root level, the Magistrate used to control the Station House Officer (SHO) and was responsible for the law-and-order situation within the area of a Police Station. The system was popular among the masses because in case of police excesses, the people had an alternate in the form of the Deputy Commissioner. The entire magistrate system was also under the Deputy Commissioner. The Police headed by the district SP was under compulsion by law to cooperate and obey the orders of the District Magistrate. At the sub-divisional level, the sub-divisional magistrate who was Assistant Commissioner and in-charge of the sub-division controlled the latter along with his counterpart DSP or ASP and had full grip upon the affairs of the sub-divisions. The District Magistrate also acted as a coordinator between all departments in their capacity of a government representative and was responsible to the Commissioner while the Commissioner was responsible to the Government, that is, the Chief Secretary and the Home Secretary. The District Magistrate held meetings frequently and addressed the law-and-order situation. Likewise, the Commissioner used to hold law and order meetings at least once in a month with the DIG and all the Deputy Commissioners and SPs. In such conferences, the situation was discussed thoroughly and the Government and other agencies would have another version of the situation since they maintained contact with the Commissioner and the Deputy Commissioner and, on the other hand, with the DIG and SPs. The system is still popular in India. Sadly, in our country, the centuries-old traditions are completely wiped away without any prior analyses of the introduction of these changes. The new system, introduced in 2002, has severely affected the administration of the district, in fact there is now no division and the DIGs and RPOs are on their own. There is nobody to control them and there is no check and balance on the police’s powers. In the current system, if the Nazim and the police are on cordial terms, then the system functions smoothly. Otherwise, there is no one to save the people from the excesses of the police. Meanwhile, sources said that, if the incidents of terrorism right from the first suicidal attack on the French engineers at Sheraton hotel till the current situation with various bomb blasts, murders of politicians and Ulemas and scores of the tribal killings are taken into account, it becomes clear that the situation of crime in Karachi has become alarming with the introduction of the Police Order 2002. The alarming rise in the crime, tribal feuds and the deteriorating law-and-order situation proves that this system has failed and it is now time for the government to reintroduce the Old Commissioner System with the appointment of a Commissioner, Deputy Commissioner and the Assistant Commissioner who used to be appointed from the district management group in the past. |
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