KARACHI - The Sindh government has allocated Rs 105 billion for the security and law and order in the financial year 2018-19 as compare to the previous budget estimate of Rs 92.91 billion in the last fiscal year.

The allocation includes the budget for Sindh police of Rs 89.94 billion, which is an increase of 11 per cent. This includes sanctioned number of employee (SNE) allocation of Rs 5.3 billion for police.

To strengthen the law enforcing agencies 17,000 new vacancies have been created while to combat terrorism and maintain law and order Rs 2.4 billion is kept for procurement of latest equipment and high tech armoured vehicles.

Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah in his budget speech said “No doubt, street crime has not come to grip as effectively as it should have. However, I am hopeful that with the dedicated efforts of our law enforcement agencies this menace will also be eliminated with the passage of time,” Sindh chief minister Syed Murad Ali Shah told the assembly during a budget speech on Thursday.  “The Police Department has been moving towards specialisation and professionalism. In this regard, more specialised units have been set up such as Counter Terrorism Department, Special Security Unit, Rapid Response Force, Anti-Riot Unit, Anti Car Lifting Cell and IT cadre.”

CM Shah said that human resource capacity of the police is also being enhanced through meritocratic recruitment through NTS, training by Pakistan army, better incentive packages, and introduction of welfare schemes as well as benefits under Shaheed Compensation and Recognition Act, 2014.

“As a token of our gratitude, Rs1000 million were allocated for disbursement as compensation to the families of Shuhda and injured personnel of our security forces,” he explained. Recruitment of 10,000 police personnel made through NTS. Rs159 million provided for training of newly recruited Police Constables at Pak Army Training  Centers.

In order to prevent illegal arms, computerization of arms license system is being introduced with the allocation of Rs100 million. Shaheed’s compensation has also been enhanced from Rs5 million to Rs10 million.  Law and paramilitary affairs has been enhanced by 12 per cent from Rs10.18 billion to Rs11.42 billion.  The annual development program (ADP) for home department excluding new schemes is pitched at Rs2 billion including Rs1 billion for police and Rs990 million for prisons.

The ADP for law and paramilitary affairs excluding new schemes is pitched Rs2 billion.  Construction of courts at district courts building at Korangi, Karachi will be continued from Rs165 million under the ongoing scheme of provincial budget.   

In a bid to improve the law and order situation in the province, the home department had allocated Rs90.5 billion in the 2017-18, compared to an allocation of Rs82.3 billion in the 2016-2017. The allocation includes Rs81.1 billion for the Sindh police. This included an sanctioned number of employee allocation of Rs9.2 billion for the police.

Investigation capability is being enhanced by establishing a state of the art forensic lab besides DNA lab and crime record database.  For the first time in the history of Sindh police, all driving license branches throughout the province has been centrally connected and driving licenses are being delivered to the applicants at their doorstep through courier service.

Public-police interface is being strengthened by establishing facilitation centers at each Divisional Headquarter for providing people-friendly one window police services to citizens, including the registration of FIRs and lodging of miscellaneous complaints.

Syed Murad Ali Shah said that a large number of schemes are proposed, particularly in the following areas: Revamping of CTD and creating a professional & dedicated force styled as Counter Terrorism Force (CTF), adding that enhancing compensation for Shaheed and injured at par with other provinces and allocating Rs2 billion compensation package.

“The government has created 2,782 posts for security of CPEC related projects, 2,959 posts for Training, Crime Branch, Traffic and Technical Training Sindh for enhancement of capacity of these units; and 11,259 posts of different ranks for Sindh police.

“The government has allocated funds worth Rs5.712 billion in SNE (New) 2018-19 for purchase of Physical Assets; Rs.5.348 billion for Sindh police; Rs306.855 million for Pakistan Rangers (Sindh); and Rs14.865 million for Frontier Constabulary (Sindh); and Rs42.996 million for Home Department and its attached offices,” he added.

There are certain measures which are out of mandate and purview of provincial governments. “We have therefore taken up them with federal government for further improvement in overall crime control,” he said, for example: Setting up an integrated national database comprising CNIC, Driving license, vehicle number plate, arms license, SIM,” he said.

“Making unified criminal record database at national level with access available to all the law enforcement agencies. The Sindh police are also going to develop a mechanism for effective monitoring of social media.