KP Police finding it hard to meet officers’ shortage

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa will be more dependent on juniors after nomination of two regional police officers (RPOs) for the War Course and the cancellation of transfer of another senior cop to the province.

The bosses of the force have been demanding for the last many years to declare KP a Hard Area so every senior officer spends a mandatory period in the province, ending the dearth of seasoned cops.

Despite severely hit by the terrorism for the last over a decade, the Centre never paid any heed to the demand for posting of senior policemen to head key offices. There are not much additional inspectors general in KP to assist the IGP at central police office. The worst crises, however, is at the district police officer (DPO) level where junior grade-18 and grade-17 cops had to be posted after giving them shoulder promotion.

A source said the RPO Malakand Akhtar Hayat Gandapur and RPO Hazara Mohammad Saeed Wazir have recently been nominated for the War Course at the National Defence University. Five officers of grade-19 and 18 have been transferred out of the KP in the last few weeks. The force is struggling to fight dearth of seasoned policemen in all grades. Besides, a former inspector general of police of Islamabad who was recently transferred to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa finally landed in the Anti-Narcotics Force instead of KP Police while another, expected to report from Punjab, has got delayed his transfer.

The force recently approved a policy under which grade-17 DSPs can be posted as DPOs due to shortage of officers in grade-18. KP at present has only 19 officers against sanctioned 54 positions of SPs.

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which was already short of 57 per cent officers from grade-18 to grade-21, has lost more cops during the last few weeks. The province will need more officers in grade-18 and 19 if the police force was extended to Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

Some officers, who were posted in smaller districts, are also planning to be transferred out of KP after they felt ignored by posting their juniors in bigger and important towns. In case of their transfer out of KP, the crises will deepen, leaving the KP police at the mercy of juniors.