Breaking barriers: 4 women posted as additional SHOs in Khyber

PESHAWAR: In a major development to boost female policing in erstwhile tribal districts, four policewomen were posted as additional station house officers (Ad SHOs) and one woman was posted as assistant line officer in the Khyber district, officials said on Saturday.

They said that Mehek Pervez Masih has been posted as additional SHO Landikotal, Naila Jabbar as additional SHO Ali Masjid, Fatima Sameen Jan, additional SHO Bara and Nusrat Bibi has been posted as additional SHO Jamrud. Also, Shanzeh has been posted as additional Line Officer Bara.

“They have already served well in their areas and have resolved many issues in Bara and Khyber in general,” District Police Officer, Khyber, Saleem Abbas Kulachi told The News. He added tribal women would be more comfortable now to approach police through the female officers deputed in their respective areas to seek justice.

The DPO hoped the move would help resolve many issues related to women in the Khyber district.

Earlier, the police in Kurram district had posted a woman, Samreen Amir, as the first additional station house officer (additional SHO) last year. This was the first time any woman police officer was posted as an additional SHO in any former tribal area of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Another woman, Sofia Masih, was posted as an additional moharrir. Sofia Masih was earlier posted as the in-charge of the women’s desk in Kurram a couple of years back.

There were not many women posted as SHOs even in the settled districts of KP, including Peshawar.

Only one woman was posted as acting SHO – that, too, for a few days - in the Gulberg Police Station in Peshawar many years back.

No other woman cop from the province recruited as a constable or assistant sub-inspector could become an SHO or sub-divisional officer in any KP town in the past. Some of these women have now reached the rank of superintendent of police.

A few women from the police service, however, remained SDPOs as well as district police officers in KP.

Sonia Shamroz, an officer of the Police Service of Pakistan, is currently serving as assistant inspector general Establishment at the Central Police Office. She also served as the first woman DPO in KP. Two women ASPs were serving in the capital city recently.