Rawalpindi - Rawalpindi police and other law enforcement agencies are ready to guard Muharram-ul-Haram processions and maintain law and order in the district.
For the purpose, a total of 7,000 well-equipped policemen would be deployed in Rawalpindi district to protect 316 mourning processions and 1,765 religious gatherings. Moreover, Pakistan Army and Rangers would also be deployed at sensitive places during the Muharram, informed police spokesman Inspector Raja Fayyaz-ul-Haq here on Friday.
According to him, all the roads and routes of processions would be sealed with barbwires and other stuff and no one would be allowed to stand on rooftops of commercial and residential buildings situated along the routes of mourning processions. Display of weapons would also be banned in the district, the spokesman said. During morning processions, air surveillance would also be conducted to ensure foolproof security.
Rawalpindi police completed all the arrangements to maintain peace during the Muharram-ul-Haram and some 7,000 policemen, volunteers, Elite Force and lady police would be deployed to give security cover to the processions, he said adding that special checking of the procession routes would be completed after clearance by the bomb disposal squad (BDS).
Moreover, CCTV cameras and walkthrough gates would also be installed to provide complete security cover to the mourners, Raja Fayyaz added.
On the other land, a high-level meeting was also held by city police officer (CPO) with Ulema of different schools of thought, trader unions and members of district peace committee to review security arrangements being made for Muharram.
Addressing the participants, the CPO said that security of Rawalpindi has been beefed up to avoid any untoward incident during Muharram. He said that the police would protect the mourners at any cost and no body would be allowed to shatter peaceful atmosphere. He said that a comprehensive mechanism of body search would also be conducted during mourning processions.
He said that the main mourning procession of Muharram would be taken out from the Colonel Maqbool Hussain Imambargah and would culminate at Imambargah Qadeemi after passing through its designated routes. “Police are fully ready to protect this main procession,” the CPO vowed.
Similarly, City Traffic Police (CTP) Rawalpindi announced a comprehensive traffic plan for Muharram to save the citizens from any type of mess. According to the plan announced by SSP/Chief Traffic Officer (CTO) Shuhaib Khurram Janbaz, the parking lots would be established far away from the mourning processions and Majalis and no one would be allowed to park one’s vehicles along with the routes of mourning processions. He said that police have also launched a special campaign against vehicles moving without numbers plates and with tainted glasses.