Salahuddin Mahsud reappointed KP IGP

PESHAWAR: Salahuddin Khan Mahsud has been appointed Inspector General of Police (IGP) Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for a second term while his predecessor Mohammad Tahir has been transferred and posted as IGP Punjab.

A notification issued by the Establishment Division in Islamabad on Friday said the former KP IGP Salahuddin Khan Mahsud has been posted the provincial police chief in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

He will replace Mohammad Tahir, who was posted as KP IGP before the July 25 general election.

Mohammad Tahir will now head the Punjab Police while his predecessor Kalim Imam has been posted the police chief of Sindh province, the notification stated.

This is for the second time that Salahuddin was posted KP Police chief. In March last year, Mahsud took over the command of the force a couple of weeks after he was promoted to grade-21, becoming one of the youngest police chiefs of the country at the age of 52.

He remained the police chief of the province until all the provincial police heads were transferred just before the general election on July 25 to hold free and fair polls.

Mahsud has headed the Special Branch and the Counter-Terrorism Department of the KP Police as additional inspector general. He remained the district and divisional head of the force in different regions of the KP before he left for an assignment abroad and later reported to the province and served against key positions.

The new IGP will face a tough challenge to continue reforms within the force along with going after the networks of criminals and terrorists all over the province.

He is to play an important role in extending the KP Police to the erstwhile tribal areas.

Another major challenge that Salahuddin is to face is to reduce the number of unnecessary search and strike operations, especially those carried out door-to-door in some specific areas that only bother the general public and focus only on intelligence-based operations against the terrorist and suspects.

Most of these search and strike operations, especially those carried out door-to-door, resulted in the humiliation of respectable and innocent people.

The residents of South Waziristan have thanked the federal and KP governments for appointing Salahuddin Mahsud to head the KP Police.

A jirga of the elders in Tank held on Friday said the appointment of Mahsud was a good gesture for the people of erstwhile tribal areas.