Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah, presiding over the 27th apex committee meeting, directed law enforcement agencies to launch targeted operation against 787 repeat offenders, 540 drug dealers and 244 land grabbers identified through an extensive exercise, apart from carrying out intelligence-based combing operation against anti-social and anti-state elements to curb terrorist incidents taking place in the city.
The meeting was attended by provincial ministers Nasir Shah, Sharjeel Memon, adviser on law Murtaza Wahab, Karachi Corps Commander Lt. Gen. M Saeed, Chief Secretary Sohail Rajput, Advocate General Sindh, IG Sindh Mushtaq Maher, DG Rangers Major Gen Iftikhar Chaudhry, Prosecutor General, Adl IGs Karachi, CDT, Special Branch, PSCM Fayaz Jatoi, Home secretary Saeed Mangnijo, the provincial head of Intelligence agencies and other officers concerned.
The apex committee, at the outset of the meeting, condemned the killing of three Chinese teachers at Karachi University and vowed to bring the culprit to book through a coordinated, comprehensive, and intelligence-based operation for which the meeting was told that different parties have been constituted by different agencies to unearth the mastermind of the attack.
The chief minister in consultation with all the agencies/participants, including intelligence decided to further strengthen the intelligence network and worked out its sharing mechanism so that timely operations could be conducted against the terrorists.
The meeting also condemned the blast at Saddar and the law enforcement agencies were directed to investigate the attack and act accordingly.
The meeting was told that top investigators were investigating the attack on Chinese teachers. Various aspects have been covered in the investigation, which are leading to the culprits, the mastermind and their facilitators. The CTD has collected solid evidence to work out the incident.
Evidence has been collected about the Saddar blast and that would definitely help the agencies reach the culprits.
The meeting was given a detailed briefing on the social media being used by the terrorist outfits and other criminal groups. The identification of terrorist outfits and their social media accounts were made using the number of their followers and traffic on their accounts.
The premier agencies were assigned the task to comb out those who were spreading venomous material on social media, brainwashing the incent youngsters against the state and state institutions and instigating them to kill innocent people as was done in Karachi university.
“We will have to control the anti-statement and anti-social elements by using the latest technology, gadgets and tools, including social media,” said CM.
The meeting was informed that through an extensive exercise conducted on the criminal record of the criminals operating in the city 787 persons have been identified as repeat offenders, 540 drug dealers and 244 land grabbers.
The lists of the identified criminals prepared by the agencies were shared with each other [police, Rangers and Corps headquarter] so that action as decided by the chief minister could be accelerated.
In the list names of the criminals, their addresses, CNICs, mobile numbers, photos or exposure, and age have been mentioned. It was pointed out that most of the street criminals, drug dealers or land grabbers might be used by the terrorists in their anti-state activities.
The meeting was told that in 2013 the street crime cases were recorded at 1,506 cases per month, but they have increased to 3,939 per month in 2002. At this, it was argued that in 2013 people were afraid and had no confidence in the police to register the case but with the passage of time the public confidence in the police has improved and they have started registering their cases.
The task of installation of trackers in motorcycles was assigned to new Transport Minister Shrjeel Inam Memon. This matter comes into the meeting off and on but now it needs to be implemented, the CM said.
In the previous apex committee meeting, it was decided to construct roads in the katcha area so that kidnapping cases and the cases of smuggling of arms and ammunition. At this, the chief minister said that 27km out of 57km of roads have been constructed and he directed the chief secretary to ensure the allocation of more funds in the next year’s budget so that the remaining portions of the roads could be constructed.
It was pointed out in the meeting that during different protests and rallies slogans were raised against the state and state institutions. The chief minister said that such an attitude was not acceptable. He added that he would not tolerate such elements. Shah directed the police and Rangers to monitor such elements and take action against them.
The meeting also took serious notice of the blats on the railway track and directed the agencies to act against the involved persons.
The meeting was told that around 400,000 unregistered Afghan nationals were living in Karachi. Moreover, 71,429 Afghans were registration cardholders and illegal immigrants of other nationalities were in addition to them.
It was pointed out that the cross-border relationship between Afghanistan and Pakistan has a long and varied history. There was no proper mechanism for registration of Afghan refugees, therefore it was decided to request the federal government strengthen the border management system so that illegal immigrants could not manage to penetrate.
The chief minister directed intelligence agencies to prepare a separate party with a solo assignment of keeping an eye on illegal immigrants living in different localities of the city which have already been identified.
Several incidents of illegal occupation of government/ private land by land grabbers have surfaced, these land grabbers have strong linkages with criminal elements.
The chief minister said that the provincial government had created an anti-encroachment force at the Board of Revenue in 2011. The anti-encroachment police during 2022 registered 80 FIRs and arrested 150 land grabbers. The chief minister directed the chief secretary to decentralize anti-encroachment police at the district level and keep their performance monitoring.
It was pointed out that the use of synthetic drugs by students of schools and colleges is on the rise in Karachi. To curb the growing trend of drug abuse in educational institutions, the chief minister directed the police and district administration to engage university administration/ academia and initiate a crackdown against drug peddlers. “Students should be thoroughly monitored by the School/ College/ University administration on campuses to check if they are taking drugs,” Mr Shah said.
The meeting was told that 1,714 narcotics peddlers in education institutions were enlisted, of them, 396 were in jails, 440 on bail and 878 at large. The meeting directed the agencies, including police and rangers to arrest the absconders.
The meeting was told that the Safe City project was being started for which various stages have been achieved. The chief minister said that he has held a meeting on the issues of the project recently. He added that almost all the bottlenecks in the project identified by the consultants and project director I were being removed. “The cost escalation of the project, due to dollar-rupee variation, PC-1 is being prepared so that project could be started in different phases,” he said.
