Salman Yousafzai
PESHAWAR: Due to a shortage of investigators and heavy workload on investigation wing of Peshawar Police department 95 % criminals were acquitted and only five percent criminals were convicted in 2017.
According to official statistics obtained by The Frontier Post revealed that 6406 cases of crime against persons and property have been registered in Peshawar for further investigation among 6406, the court has decided 50 cases and only in two cases, criminals were convicted and in 48 cases, the alleged culprits were acquitted during 2017.
In 2016, 5719 cases of crime against property and people were registered in different police stations of Peshawar and 58 cases were decided by the court while the rest were pending. Among 58 cases, in seven cases the criminals were convicted while in 51 cases the alleged accused were acquitted.
The police department has been spending a huge amount on investigation wing to improve their capability as KP Police department allotted four million rupees in 2017 and 11.8 million rupees in 2016 and 12.00 million rupees in 2015, according to official statistics.
A police investigator told on the condition of anonymity that the subordinates have to bear the expenses of raids in pursuit of the criminals. He blamed the senior officers for the mess stating that they consume all the operational funding of investigators as government funds never reach police stations level.
All of this workload is falling to a dwindling number of investigators in the police department, a high ranked police officer said.
He said that police investigation wing has been facing the shortage of officers in Peshawar.
He revealed that currently, Peshawar Police investigation wing is led by one Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), one Superin-tendent of Police (SP), and four Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSPs), Nine Inspectors, 72 Sub Inspectors (SIs) and 13 Assistant Sub Inspectors (ASIs). He said policemen in Peshawar also don’t like investigation wing as they prefer to perform duty in operation, “police officers consider investigation wing as punishment” he added.
He said that the team members of investigation are not well-trained and qualified, he revealed that currently, qualification of four inspectors are matriculated, two inspectors are intermediate, two inspectors completed are bachelor degree and only one inspector is a master degree holder.
He added that there is one SI who is under metric, 39 are matriculated, 22 SIs done intermediate, eight are bachelor degree holders and five are master degree holders.
Similarly, six ASIs are matriculated, five are intermediate, three are bachelor degree holders and only one is a master degree holder.
Malik Maqsood Ali, Deputy Director Human Right Directorate KP, and the former public prosecutor said that police investigation teams are not well trained and mostly policemen in investigation wing consider it punishment to be an investigator in the police.
He suggested that police department needed to increase incentives for investigation wings to improve their performance as in most cases the investigation wing did not receive the allocated funds to police station level.
He added that police also need to recruit well educated and well-trained detectives as most of the investigators are not educated and well-trained.
He said that eyewitness may tell lie but circumstances pieces of evidence can’t, so police also need to keep the focus on circumstances pieces of evidence.
He said police investigators are still using 1934 ways and means to investigate the cases which make hurdles in a proper investigation.
Experts cite several reasons behind the police investigators failure in solving cases against people and property are corruption, lack of interest, and faulty investigations of Peshawar police.
