Oct 29, 2015
LAHORE: More than 20,000 policemen will perform security duties in Lahore on the local body elections day on Saturday. Besides this, Punjab Home Secretary Azam Suleman Khan told a TV channel that they had written to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) that 44 companies of Army and six of Rangers be called to be on standby.
Police authorities finalsed a security plan which divides the city into three categories - A, B and C - and policemen would be deployed according to sensitivity of the polling station.
Deputy Inspector General (DIG) Dr Haider Ashraf said a peaceful atmosphere at all polling stations would be ensured on the election day and no sensitive place would be left unguarded.
“A special crackdown was launched on illegal weapons on Tuesday and so far 18 Kalashnikov, 40 pump action rifles, 16 rifles, 19 guns, four revolvers and 70 pistols have been seized in different areas of the city,” he said.
The DIG told the participants to remain in contact with different candidates on regular basis to ensure the implementation of the code of conduct by the ECP. No political party should be allowed to carry out rallies and policemen should be deployed to provide security in all corner meetings, he added.
He also directed Mujahid Force SP Iqrar Husain and Headquarter SP Umer Saeed to take out flag march and also take special measure for the welfare of the policemen.
SSP Ather Ismail told Dawn that some 20,000 policemen with other law enforcement agencies would perform duties in the city to provide security to the voters.
He said some 850, of 3,300, polling stations were sensitive and additional police personnel would be deployed there to avoid any untoward incident.
He said the city had been categorised into 12 zones and an SP would be assigned to supervise a zone to ensure law and order there. Some 1,200 walk through gates and CCTV cameras would be installed at sensitive polling stations.
The SSP said police had set up 12 control rooms at SP offices to monitor the security situation and the rooms would be connected with a central monitoring at the DIG operations office.
He said the ECP code of conduct would be implemented and no candidate would be allowed to move around with armed guards during the elections. He said a zero tolerance policy would be implemented in case of display of weapons and resorting to aerial firing.
He said that the candidates having serious security threats could be provided police security guards.
(Daily Dawn)
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